Lucky
by IvanKaramazov
Summary: Tommy's got Cait babysitting the guy who shot up the Combat Zone. And after he disappears, she's stuck with just his robot, Curie, who is way too nice to her. Cait knows her luck won't hold out for long.
1. Chapter 1

It was a lucky hit.

Lucky enough to knock her senseless, catching her jaw and snapping her head hard to the right. White lights burst in her vision, made worse by the spotlights trained on her and the roaring of the crowd that matched the static in her head. A lucky hit. It was enough to make her drop her guard, stumble backwards, lose her footing. Her opponent noticed.

 _Shite_ , she thought, rushing to get her stance up before his uppercut landed. But her vision was still spotty, her head still playing static. Her foot slipped in a pool of her own blood, and she fell forward onto his thrust, doubling the force of it. Pain exploded across her clavicle - broken, definitely. She drew in a shuddering breath, tucked in her shoulder, and hit the ground moving. Even though she knew how much it would hurt to roll with a broken clavicle, it was better than falling to her knees and just waitin' to get killed.

"What a _hit_!" Tommy narrated. "Meatrot, with an uppercut to the chest, and folks, I can see the damage from here - but wait, Cait's back up - "

She was. She'd ended up with her back against the metal bars of the cage. On a good day she'd have no trouble with her back against the wall. Today was not a good day. The shock of rolling into standing position with her broken clavicle - feeling the separated bone scrape together as it moved - had put a ringing in her ears, and her mouth tasted like blood. _Shite_. Not blood from when her opponent, Meatrot, had clocked her in the jaw. No, she could feel this clawing its way up from inside her. From her lungs? From her stomach? Hell if she knew. Cait was no doctor.

You didn't have to be a doctor to know spittin' up blood three or four times a day wasn't a good sign.

Fuck - she'd lost her chance to attack. Gotten distracted trying to choke the blood back down. Meatrot had turned back on her, and she was too dizzy, her world was spinning, and she couldn't tell the white spots in her vision apart from the spotlights or the roaring of the crowd from the ringing in her head. It was a deadly mistake. The fucker went for her arm.

Her stance was bad, her guard was off, and all he had to do was bodyslam her right arm against the solid metal bar of the cage to produce a horrible, grinding _crunch_ and cloud her vision with blood.

Fuck, fuck, fuck - she could see her bone. Her forearm bone had snapped and ripped clean through her skin, the jagged edges of the break covered in the remains of her own muscle. She couldn't move her fingers, couldn't move her arm, but god, she could feel every inch of it.

Fuck. At what point did she stop calling them lucky hits?

"Oh, going for the arm!" Tommy exclaimed over the loudspeaker. "Can't fight without an arm, folks. That thing is out of commission..."

Her vision tunneled. Time slowed. She felt her heart beat once in her chest.

Cait grinned.

"Well, now 'm just _angry_ ," she said.

The wide, broken smile put a flash of uncertainty on Meatrot's face, disturbed the confident sadism there.

Cait slammed him in the side of the head with her left hand, palm open, right against his temple. Used correctly, palms could be harder than fists, and this hit connected flat with all her force. She saw his pupils dilate in shock, saw him stumble back and grip his skull. Blood began to leak out of his ear, and considering she hadn't hit his hear, that meant something right fucked up was going on in his head. She'd burst something important with that hit.

Fear of death crossed Meatrot's face. This wasn't a fight for entertainment for him anymore. Now, he was fighting to survive. A cornered animal, he seemed to know he had to end this fight now if he was to get help for his injury in time to avoid brain damage. He gathered all his considerable strength, lashing out for a finishing blow.

She dove forward with just as much confidence. She was no underdog in this fight. Cait grabbed her limp, swollen right hand with her left and pulled, thrust, _twisted_ her mangled arm into his gut, using the jagged edges of her own broken bone as a makeshift javelin, hard enough to clear the skin and muscle right into the lining of his stomach.

Meatrot's eyes widened one last time, making contact with hers. She looked back into them with spite, and the last thing he saw was her snarl as she yanked her arm backwards, taking his innards with her and dropping him facedown to the dirty cage floor.

The crowd went wild.

Cait stood straighter, dropping her stance and facing the screaming raiders below her, just beyond the walls of the cage. The euphoria, the rush, the intensity, washed through her, and the pain exploding all over her body only seemed to add to it. She spit out a mouthful of blood and pumped the fist of her working arm up into the air.

"Aaaand, that concludes this round!" Tommy said after a moment of shocked silence. "Cait is the _undisputed_ winner!"

The rush was an itch, the pain a fuel. She approached the bars of the cage, high as a kite, and screaming in victory herself. She looked out into the crowd, fist into the air, fire in her eyes.

" _Who's next?_ " she screamed.

Then everything went to shit.


	2. Chapter 2

Violence was a given in the Combat Zone, but when gunshots started going off, you had to know to get down. Cait didn't know which raider had pissed off which this time, but these fuckers didn't discriminate when the bullets started flying. If you were in the way, you got hit. She hadn't brought her shotgun into the cage, no weapons allowed in. She dove for cover. Unfortunately, so had Tommy, so she wound up sidled right next to his rotting flesh.

"Cait, thank god - shit, you can't fight like that," Tommy said, examining her arm.

Cait knocked his hand away, hard.

"The hell I can't," Cait snarled, then grimaced, as she realized she'd knocked off one of Tommy's fingers. Ghouls. He distractedly picked it up and put it in his pocket to sew back on later. "You saw that fight."

An explosion sounded from the other side of the room, a grenade by the looks of it.

"That's the _problem_ little bird," Tommy said. "Look, maybe we can sneak out the back if - "

"Oh, don't be such a fuckin' pansy. Next raider that kicks it, I pick up his weapon."

"You can't shoot with a mangled arm, little bird - "

" _Don't_ call me that - "

Tommy grabbed her, pushing her down further behind cover just as another grenade blew chair shrapnel over them. Cait shoved him off, before the rubble had even cleared, socking him in the face with her left elbow. It was a good thing Tommy had already lost his nose a long time ago, or that would have come off too.

" _Jesus_ , Cait - "

Then, another explosion, from the stands. Cussing.

"Who the _hell_ is that?" Cait heard a raider exclaim.

An intruder, then. Well, there was a positive side to that. Raiders were messier, and maybe whoever this was _wasn't_ out to indiscriminately kill everyone in the room. On the other hand, it was an unknown.

One last explosion, then silence.

"Shit," Tommy whispered. "Think they're done out there?"

Cait rolled her eyes, not bothering to answer and getting to her feet. Near the bar were two new figures, and the only survivors of the firefight. Some guy in a blue vault suit, accompanied by one of those Miss Nanny robots. They had stowed their weapons, and didn't look like they were here to kill anybody who didn't shoot at them. Tommy raised his voice.

"We don't want any trouble!" he shouted. Then, under his breath: "Not any _more_ , at least."

"Oh, just peek your head up, ya damn coward."

"To heck with that. I'm too pretty to go out like this." But Tommy stood, making tentative eye contact with the man in the vault suit. They eyed each other a moment before Tommy prodded: "You finished tearin' the place up now?"

"I wasn't the one throwing grenades around," the man in the vault suit said, a little defensively.

Tommy sighed, looking around at the carnage.

"Well, that coulda gone worse."

Cait snorted.

"I dunno" she said, lifting her eyebrows at the man and robot duo who had apparently taken on the entire Combat Zone single-handed. "Seemed quite the performance from where I was standin'."

"Are you fuckin _high_ or - " Tommy cut himself off. "Why am I askin'. Of course you are."

There was a certain tightness to his words, a sharpness to them, that was more intense than usual. Tommy usually gave her crap, but today it had an edge to it. She realized he'd been angry since the last fight. Well, Cait wasn't here to take Tommy's crap.

"Was still winnin' the fight, wasn't I?" Cait bit at him.

"You're strung out and gettin' sloppy is what you are. 'Course," Tommy said, looking around the room, "I suppose you ain't gotta worry about that now. Seem's this one just put us outta business." Tommy rounded on the guy in the vault suit, eyeing him suspiciously. "I'm not sure if I should kiss you, or have my little bird here feed ya your own entrails."

"I _told_ ya to quit callin' me that!" Cait threatened.

Tommy's reference to Cait drew the vault suit guy's eyes to her and, inevitably, her mangled arm, still flowing blood from where her snapped bone stuck out of her skin. Not all of the blood and gore on the wound was hers. He nodded to her arm.

"Are you alright?" he asked.

"Alright enough to take _you_ on," Cait snarled, adopting a threatening pose.

The vault guy backed off, but his robot angled its propeller jets to the back and propelled itself forward.

"You 'ave sustained _serious_ injury!" the thing exclaimed in a high-pitched French accent, moving its cybernetic limbs in what was almost a gesture of distress. "Please, allow me to fix it. Medical care is one of my primary functions."

Cait stepped back.

" _Not_ likely," she snarled.

"Cait," Tommy chided, looking at her arm. "Come on. It's free medical care. Save me a stimpack."

"Ain't no one said anything about _free_ , Tommy."

"Payment is not an issue!" the robot chimed in. "Please, medical care is a duty of mine. Allow me to assist."

Cait was about to rearrange the Miss Nanny's circuitry with a right hook, mangled arm be damned, but a look from Tommy, and she sighed and dropped her stance. It _would_ spare her the cost of a stimpack. Whatever the cost later was.

"Fine," she said, holding out her arm. "Just don't fuck it up."

The thing gave her a small dose of med-x first, so she didn't even feel it as its mechanical limbs disinfected and set her bones, what she knew from experience was usually an incredibly painful process. She didn't know how she felt about that. It set her on edge. Not that she'd prefer to be screamin' in pain, but. It set her on edge, not feeling any of it.

The vault suit guy engaged with Tommy again, after a moment watching his robot work.

"What is this place?" he asked.

It took Tommy a moment to answer, and Cait's eyebrows had shot up into her hairline, too. He'd taken the whole place on, without even knowing what it was? So it had been an unplanned, un-prepared-for, impromptu assault. And he'd succeeded at it. This was no regular mercenary.

"Not from around here, huh?" Tommy understated. "This is the the Combat Zone. Finest arena in the Commonwealth. Cait here's the headliner. Hundred plus matches, undefeated.

Vault guy's eyes shot to Cait, and she bared her teeth. Tommy continued.

"We used to serve a more legit clientele, but about two years ago a gang of raiders rolled in and we became a more...exclusive establishment...up until you took our entire client base out of the gene pool and put us out of business, that is."

"I'm sorry? Curie made it seem like you guys might be in trouble."

"I saw zat zis one 'ad sustained _serious_ injury!" the robot piped up from Cait's side, making her jump.

"Trouble?" Tommy snorted. "Nah. But keeping those idiots entertained is what kept the lights on. Not exactly sure what we're gonna do now."

"To _hell_ with 'em!" Cait rolled her eyes. "More'll come. Just need a quick breather and I'll be ready to go."

"A _breather_!?" Tommy huffed incredulously, and his eyebrows would have shot right up into his hairline too, if he'd had any. He turned on Cait, the fury he'd been partially restraining since the fight finally coming to a head. "What? So you can slam more of that _junk_ into your arm? Nah, nah, you know what? I think _this_ ," and he gestured to all the bodies littering the room, "was a blessing in disguise."

Tommy turned his full attention to the guy in the vault suit, and Cait saw him put his gameface on, like he was trying to sell something. Always playing an angle, Tommy.

"You caught the end of that bout," Tommy said, "what'd you think of Cait's work?"

The guy in the vault suit gauged both Cait and Tommy.

"I've seen better," he lied, poorly.

"Ha!" Cait snapped. "Like hell you have."

"And while she's still armed and within closing distance? You're a brave one, ain't ya?"

The robot spoke again, startling Cait. They normally didn't speak this much, these pre-war robots, but this one seemed to have a whole artificial _personality_ to go with that accent.

"She's _clearly_ talented," the robot said, even gesticulating with one of its metal limbs for emphasis, seeming to chastise the vault suit guy for underselling her ability.

"See?" Cait nodded her head to the robot as it injected a stimpack into her bicep. "'Least someone knows skill when they see it."

"It ain't your fightin' skills I'm concerned with," Tommy growled. "So here's my predicament. I suddenly got no audience. And no audience means no caps comin' in. And if you ain't bringing in caps, little bird, you ain't an asset. You're a liability. To me...and to yourself."

There was a moment of shocked silence, when Cait couldn't even concentrate her rage into a response. _And while I'm still armed and within closing distance, Tommy?_

"So..." Tommy continued, "here's what I'm thinkin'. What say I let you take over her contract? She goes with you, watches your back...look, you'd be doing me a favor while I try to get the place back in order. What d'ya say?"

"Me? And him?" Cait snapped.

She didn't even _know_ this guy, and neither did Tommy. What the _hell_ Tommy?

"I vould like to know what Miss _Cait_ thinks," the robot piped up, almost indignantly.

Cait stood, angry.

"Yeah! Don't I get a say in all this?"

"Please, Miss Cait!" the robot protested, following her as she stood. "You still 'ave broken bones for me to attend to!"

Right, shit. Her clavicle, swelling up angry red and purple and making it hard to breathe. Not that it didn't always hurt to breathe. At least some of the blood she was coughing up had to be coming from her lungs, the way they ached every time she inhaled.

"That ain't how a contract works," Tommy told her, and seeing her step towards him, elaborated, "besides, you really wanna stay here? No audience. No caps. No one to talk to but _yours truly_."

Cait experienced in a flash what it would be like to sit here for months on end, with her thumb up her ass, listenin' to Tommy give her crap about what chems she used when and callin' her little bird and fuckin' _pretendin_ ' like he cared. Like he wasn't gonna throw her out on the street the moment the time came, just like he was doin' now.

"Jesus," she snarled in disgust, leaning back a bit to allow the robot to inject another stimpack near the swelling at her clavicle. "Point taken."

"That a girl. So, she's on board." Tommy turned back to the vault suit guy. "Now what about you?"

But vault guy seemed more suspicious than before.

"She's your headliner," he said, "hundred plus matches, undefeated. Why would you want her to go with me?"

"Yeah Tommy," Cait said, shoving the robot off and advancing another step into his personal space, "just why the hell are you trying to get rid of me?"

"Maybe I just think you deserve some time off. Maybe I like this one's face. I dunno. I usually got a good sense about this sorta thing. So what do you say?"

"I say you're bullshittin' me," Cait snarled, grabbing Tommy by his lapels and slamming him against the bars of the cage.

"Oh, there is to be ze _fighting_!" the robot wailed, in evident dismay.

"It's the _Combat Zone_ , love," Cait snarled. "Now why don't ya tell me the real reason you don't want me around no more, Tommy?"

But Tommy was the only one who didn't look afraid. He looked right up at Cait from the bars of the cage with sadness and disappointment.

"Look," he said, "truth is, all that junk, it's been making you careless. And I don't want to be the one doing colour commentary when you finally hit the floor. Alright?" Cait was shocked enough that when he pushed her off of him, her hands fell away. He brushed the front of his suit down, unwrinkling it from where her fists had dug into it. "So just do me this favour. Both of you. Please."

After a tense moment, the guy in the vault suit spoke.

"Sure. I could use someone watching my back."

"Good. It's settled then. And here," Tommy said, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a sack of cloth with about a hundred caps in it. "Take this. It's the purse from the last fight. Consider it a retainer."

"Now just wait a second," Cait couldn't believe this was actually happening. She and Tommy didn't exactly get along, but she'd been here at the Combat Zone for three years. _Three years_. And he wanted to just throw all of that away? Wasn't she worth anything to him? She felt herself grasping at straws. "What exactly are you gonna do without me here?"

"You don't need to worry about me," Tommy said, brushing her off. "I'll get this place set up right, maybe find a less bloodsoaked clientele. Now get the hell outta here." Tommy looked her in the eyes, and that disappointment, that sadness, was there again. "You ain't welcome anymore, little bird."

Cait's heart dropped into her stomach.

"You're a real son of a bitch, you know that, Tommy?"

Tommy smiled at her.

"You don't have to tell me," he said.

Cait snarled at him and stormed out of the cage, picking up her shotgun outside the gate and pumping it once for effect. Her arm was still numb from the med-x, but that had never stopped her before.

"You two ready t' hit the road?" she shouted back, headed for the counter of the bar.

The guy in the vault suit looked at the robot, who _whirred_ a little helplessly, and seemed to get his ass in gear. Cait grabbed a satchel from one of the dead bodies - Jackhammer, she'd kicked his ass in a fight a few months back - and took about half a second to sweep all of the chems under the counter into the bag, making eye contact with Tommy as she did so. He shook his head and turned away.

When she looked up, that Miss Nanny robot had jetted its way right up to the side of the bar opposite her, even managed to sneak up on her. Impressive, for a hunk of metal.

"Are _you_ ready to his ze road, Miss Cait?" the robot asked. "You're arm must be very numb still."

"I'm feelin' good enough to head out and crush some skulls," Cait said, already sidling out from behind the bar and heading towards the door. The sooner they got out of Tommy's place, the better. As he'd said, she wasn't welcome. And she had no intention of making herself a burden on anyone. A liability, he'd called it. Balls to that.

The vault guy caught up with her, grabbed her arm, before she made her way out the door. She turned to him with a glare that shot daggers. She probably wasn't making great headway with her new employer, but whatever. He'd probably tell her to fuck off before the week was over, just like Tommy. This was only temporary.

"Wait," he said, "I want to make sure you know what you're getting into."

"Do I look like a girl who cares?"

"You might care about this," vault suit said, glancing briefly at the Miss Nanny robot next to him. "We're...we're hunting a courser. An institute courser."

Whatever-the-hell that was.

"Is it dangerous?" she asked.

" _Most_ dangerous," the robot chirped.

" _Good_ ," Cait growled, and threw the doors open, stepping out under the shitty grey sky of the Commonwealth.


	3. Chapter 3

'Dangerous' turned out to be pretty fuckin' boring, most of the time. Before they could fight this infamous Institute Courser, they had to find the damn thing, and it did not want to be found. They combed through ruins of two-hundred year old cities, listening to the pip-boy on the vault guy's arm _beep, beep, beep_ with varying consistency. Boring. As. Hell.

Sure, there were a few firefights, traipsing around the Commonwealth ruins, but they had guns, and none of them were amateurs, so they were mostly over in a minute or so. An injury here or there. Cait had taken a bullet in the arm, and Nate, as she learned the vault guy's name was, had knocked his head against some rubble in a fight with a super mutant, but medical-care-is-a-duty-of-mine Curie had them taken care of, for the most part.

That was another thing. The robot? It had a name, and considerably more personality than Nate. After a couple of hours of Cait referring to the thing as "your robot," "that thing over there," "bucket-of-bolts," "tin can," "trash can," and "saw-hands Sally," Nate had finally put his foot down.

"She has a name," he had said.

"It's a robot."

"I am a Contagions Vulnerability Robotic Infirmary Engineer," the robot chimed in, "or CVRIE. The human scientists call me Curie. Or more properly, they called me zis when they were alive."

"That's fuckin' ominous," Cait had muttered.

Nate cracked a small smile.

"Curie was locked up in a vault, and the scientists there gave her a really good AI. I consider her my equal, and I recommend you do, as well."

"Whatever," Cait had said. "I'm just here ta kill things."

Of which so far had tallied nine raiders, four super mutants, and seven radroaches. Jesus, she was so bored she was even tallying her _radroach_ kills now. It was getting towards the end of the day, and they didn't have much to show for it. A couple of times the beeping had sped up; the signal, or whatever the hell Nate was following, had gotten stronger. But no matter how strong the signal got, they never seemed to be able to see any sign of the Courser. Nate slammed the side of his pip-boy with his hand as the beeping sped up, then slowed down again, and finally disappeared entirely. He grunted in frustration.

"Ya sure that thing's actually working?"

"It's the best we've got," Nate frowned. "Maybe it's interference from the buildings."

"What's left of 'em, anyway."

Nate sighed, looking almost nostalgically at the crumbling ruins around him.

"We should make camp," he said, "before the sun goes down. Try again tomorrow."

"Good," Cait said, wiping an arm across her brow. "I can't wait to get out of this _god damned_ heat."

"It is currently eighty-two degrees fahrenheit, twenty-seven degrees celsius," Curie contributed.

"Thanks," Cait said sarcastically.

"You are _most_ welcome, Miss Cait."

Cait rolled her eyes.

They made camp in the old CIT ruins, in an alcove that shaded them from the sun, and sheltered from view from the river and the main road so they could build a fire. According to Nate, the Coursers were supposed to teleport to the CIT ruins, so they had a good chance of picking up a signal here in the morning. They'd held onto some of the radroaches they'd killed earlier. Radroach meat tasted like shit, but hey, it was food, and cooked over a fire it was even edible. Cait had found a bottle of whiskey on a dead raider earlier, too. It wasn't the worst meal she'd had this week.

She discovered quickly Nate didn't know shit about cooking, no matter how experienced he might seem with fighting. He acted like he'd never seen a radroach before. Cait had quickly taken over, and Nate had gratefully handed the skewer to her. He looked tired. The flames highlighted the dark circles under Nate's eyes in a way they grey low-lit day hadn't. Cait wondered how long they'd been tracking this Courser down for.

"So," she said, taking a seat at the fire with her back against the building, "you got a reason to be huntin' this thing? A contract? What's the payout?"

Nate glanced at Curie for a moment, who spun idly.

"Not exactly," he said. "I'm after a piece of hardware, in the Courser's brain. A Courser chip."

"Is it valuable?"

"Not everything is about material gain, Miss Cait," Curie chided. "Monsieur Nate is trying to recover his little boy."

The campsite stilled a bit, gained an air of solemnity.

"I'm sorry about your son," Cait said. "Where does this chip factor in?"

"It's complicated, but...I'm going to use it to get into the Institute." Nate gripped his rifle a little tighter. "That's where they've got Shaun. If we can get the chip, and get someone who's able to read it, I'll be able to get inside."

Cait gave a low whistle. The Institute. Damn. The Combat Zone must have been small potatoes for this guy, if he was going up against them.

"I understand if the Institute is more than you bargained for," Nate said. "I won't hold it against you if you want to back out."

And go where? Cait shrugged.

"I don't mind hoofin' it as long as there's some excitement at the end of the road," she said, slugging back some more whiskey. "Besides, we've got this fancy robot butler thing - I mean, Curie - to do all the menial tasks for us."

"Ha! Good luck with that. Curie does what she wants. Isn't that right, Curie?"

Curie spun a little, almost as though to petulantly turn away from Nate.

"I'm sure I 'ave no idea what you are talking about, Monsieur."

"Curie," Nate said, glancing between Cait and Curie for a moment, "why don't you steal Cait's whiskey?"

Cait stiffened, raising her eyebrows and gripping her bottle tighter.

"Take my bottle," she threatened, "and we're gonna have a problem."

Some static sounded from Curie.

"My audio circuits must be malfunctioning," Curie said. "I believe I heard you say to provide Miss Cait with another stimpack, yes?"

Cait kept her hand close to the shotgun at her side as Curie drifted around the fire to where Cait sat, watching carefully for any signs of aggression. But Curie just patiently held out a stimpack. Slowly, Cait reached out and took it.

"What a fortunate malfunction for ze both of us," Curie said, pointing a mechanical arm at Nate. "Stealing is a _felony_ and _not very polite_ , either."

"See what I mean?" Nate grinned, as Curie drifted back over to her original position. Cait followed her movements, almost forgetting to store the stimpack in her bag. "When I first found her, she needed authorization from Vault-Tec personnel to leave the room she'd been trapped in for two hundred years. I'm not Vault-Tec, by any stretch of the imagination, and I kept telling her that, but she just insisted she'd heard me authorize her and let herself out. She's got some programming, but she's not about to let it stop her."

"Zese faulty audio circuits are so troublesome," Curie said, almost...playfully.

"Sure," Nate snorted. "It's the audio circuits that are troublesome."

Great. So the robot did whatever the hell it wanted. That was sure not to backfire on them down the road. But it wasn't like Cait wasn't used to sleeping with one eye open. She shrugged, knocked back some more whiskey.

"So," Cait said, savouring the burn in her throat and eying up the robot with more gravity than before, "what did you do in a vault for two hundred years?"

"Two hundred and ten years, actually. I worked on ze development of a broad-spectrum cure."

"A what?"

"Kind of a cure-all," Nate piped up. "A drug to cure any disease. The Vault was supposed to move to human trials eventually, on the civilian population, but that effort was sabotaged, so the scientists never got that far. But Curie figured out the cure anyway."

"That's impressive," Cait said, "and valuable. Could make a _lot_ of caps offa that."

"Unfortunately, zere are none left," Curie seemed to sigh. "Ze cure was created from organic compounds, which deteriorated over time. By ze time Monsieur Nate found me, zere was only one dose left."

"Well, that makes it all the more valuable. Where's that dose?"

"I used it on a kid, from Vault 81," Nate said. "That's why I found Curie in the first place. Kid got himself bit by one of the infected mole rats the scientists in Vault 81 were experimenting on, and without that cure, he would've died. I went looking for a cure and found Curie."

"Damn shame," Cait said, glancing over to the robot. "Seems a waste of two hundred years worth of work."

"Not at all," Curie enthused. "I was _most_ pleased with how ze cure was used. It made quite a difference to zat little boy. And now, I am free to study the world above and further my scientific explorations!"

Cait sighed, nursed a migraine between her eyes that the alcohol probably wouldn't help with. No pay for hunting the Courser, no cure left to sell, just a bunch of sob stories.

"So what I'm hearin' is that we aren't exactly flush for caps, now or at any point in the future."

Nate grimaced.

"Broke as hell," he admitted. "I've got about thirty-six caps, plus whatever was in the retainer Tommy just gave us."

"Christ," Cait said. Even worse than she'd thought. She reached out a hand. "Lemme count what was in the pot Tommy handed over, won't ya?"

Nate dug the sack of caps out of his bag and handed it to her. It felt hefty enough, at least. She pulled back the drawstring and felt something decidedly non-metallic and fleshy fall into her lap. In the flickering firelight, she picked it up and examined it, not registering at first what it was.

"Oh me _fucking_ god," she said, a wicked grin plastering itself across her lips.

"Is zat...a finger?" Curie exclaimed.

"It's Tommy's finger. Fell off during the fight, and he stuffed it in his pocket to sew back on later. Musta accidentally wound up in here. Serves you right, Tommy, you son of a bitch."

Cait chucked the finger across the courtyard, in considerably better spirits than she'd been in for most of the day.

The haul from the pot wasn't bad. A little over a hundred caps. It could last them long enough for now, until they picked up a paying gig or found some decent salvage to sell. And she had scored a pretty good supply of Psycho from under the bar in the Combat Zone, so she wasn't desperate for caps. By the time she was finished counting, Nate was settling down to sleep. She handed the bag back over to him, and he grunted a thanks, placing it back in his daybag.

Curie was standing watch for them, and since Curie was a robot and didn't need to sleep, they didn't have to sleep in shifts. Then again, Cait was now fully aware that this robot did whatever the hell it wanted, so she wasn't about to sleep easily, not even with half a bottle of whiskey sloshing around in her stomach. It took her a couple hours even to close her eyes, and a couple more to fall into a light slumber.

So when Nate's signal started _beep, beep, beep_ -ing from the pip-boy on his arm again, Cait came very close to shooting him.

"Christ!" she groaned. "Will you turn that fuckin' thing off?"

Nate sat up, quickly.

"Signal's back," he murmured, looking around. "Sounds close this time."

"We're not gonna catch the damn thing tonight. Turn it off and get some rest, I say."

But Nate ignored her, padding carefully past the alcove of the building and glancing around the greater courtyard. All of the sudden, the signal went crazy. _Beep-beep-beep-beep-beep_ , lightning fast, the red light on Nate's pipboy flashing madly along with it.

"Shite," Cait said, clambering to her feet and grabbing her shotgun.

She and Nate rushed out to the courtyard, following the signal, Curie trailing along behind them. This was the strongest it had ever been, the Courser had to be here. But the courtyard was empty. They swung their guns around, wildly. Not even a radroach to shoot.

"Maybe the thing really is...broken," Nate said, "or, on the wrong frequency, or something. I thought I got it right, but..."

Cait lowered her shotgun. If the frequency really was wrong, then this poor bastard and his robot had been tracking nothing for days. All the while missing his son and growing those lines under his eyes. She made a mental note not to expect Nate to be a pleasant traveling companion.

Suddenly, Cait caught something out of the corner of her eye. Not movement, per se. More like heat coming off of asphalt on a hot day. She brought her shotgun back up, swiveling around and trying to find it again.

"Do you see something, Miss Cait?" Curie asked.

Cait knew that haze. In the Combat Zone, more than one raider had tried to use a stealth boy to steal the pot from the fight.

"...somethin's ghostin' us," she said, quietly.

There. She saw it again, a faint shimmer against the road. And it wasn't hot enough out to be heat. Cait fired a round.

"Argh!"

For just a moment, the stealth field flickered off, just long enough to catch the ghost of an image of a man with long black hair pulled back into a tie, clutching his bloodied right arm.

"Holy shit," Nate said, getting his weapon ready and giving chase. "That's him! That's the Courser!"

"No shite!" Cait said, following him down to the road.

The Courser had disappeared again, but now they knew his tricks. And they knew the signal was reliable enough.

They dashed through the streets, turning when the signal faded to pick it up again. The turned the corner onto a small group of raiders, and Cait took out three of the four in quick succession, one with a blast from her shotgun, one with the butt of her shotgun, and the last with another round. Nate got the fourth one, and they continued on. The signal was fading, but not by much.

Cait caught sight of the haze again, in the distance, a door opening and closing.

"That building up ahead," she said, "he went in there."

"Greenetech Genetics," Curie said, reading some sign Cait hadn't bothered to notice.

She and Nate burst through the double doors into an absolutely _trashed_ lobby.

"Damn," Cait said, coming to a halt at the complete annihilation in front of her. "Did someone drive a bulldozer through here?"

She wasn't even sure how to get out of the entrance room. The stairs had been blown to shit, the walkways collapsed. She could hear fighting upstairs, surely that's where the Courser was, but how could they get there if the stairs were all gone?

"That bulldozer left behind a fair amount of bodies," Nate said, grim. "Did one Courser really do all this?"

Cait focused on the bodies for the first time.

"Gunners," she recognized. "They're not too easy to take down, either."

"Who are zese 'Gunners'?" Curie asked, drifting in behind them. "Per'aps they are friendly?"

Cait snorted.

"Not likely. First there's trash, then there's Gunners. Easy to remember, eh?"

She winked at Curie, and turning back to the carnage, her eyes landed on a door to the right. At first glance, it had seemed like a supply closet in the dim lighting, but with her eyes adjusting, she could see now it was actually a service stairway. She nudged Nate.

"There," she said, making for the door with her shotgun barrel leveled in front of her. Gunners didn't fuck around. Suddenly, the loudspeakers crackled to life, and Cait swung around, unsure of where the sound was coming from.

"The Courser's on the second floor," a voice boomed from all directions. "Kill on sight. Send reinforcements to the lobby in case there are more."

"Definitely Gunners," Cait growled. "You sure you wanna storm this building, Nate? Sounds like the whole place is a goddamned Gunner fortification. A bit riskier than takin' on the Combat Zone."

Nate pushed past her into the stairwell, urgent, and Cait tried not to get too riled up about that.

"This is probably the best chance we'll get," Nate said. "If there really is a whole army of Gunners here, they'll slow the Courser down and maybe even take him out. Then all we have to do is finish up the Gunners."

"Oh, well if that's all," Cait muttered, following up the stairs behind him.

The stairwell opened up into a huge indoor courtyard, complete with huge long-dead trees and winding railings and balconies and walkways. It might have been one of the most beautiful things Cait had ever seen, if it hadn't come equipped with two mounted turrets staring them down from the other side of it.

Cait fired her shotgun into the one on the right, the one closest to her, knowing that she couldn't get both of them and she would just have to accept the one on the left shooting either her or Nate. She flinched as she fired, waiting for the bullets to come. They didn't. Curie was hovering behind her, firing a laser round from one of her mechanical arms into the left turret. And as Cait swiveled to check and see if Nate had been shot, she saw that he'd been firing into a wall turret mounted above them that she hadn't even seen. Huh.

"Not bad," she said, lowering her weapon a moment and appraising them.

She'd never fought with a team before. The loudspeakers flared back to life.

"What's going on down there? How many are we dealing with?"

The explosions of the turrets hadn't gone unnoticed then. Cait dashed for the door on the other side of the courtyard, making her way around the railings to get there. They needed to get out of the open. The turrets might be gone, but this courtyard was open to almost all of the upper floors, and any Gunner leaning out of a balcony could snipe them.

"The Courser is now on the third floor," the loudspeakers blared. "Reports of a second intruder in the East wing near the courtyard."

There were two more in the hallway past the door. Cait took the one on the right, Nate the one on the left, before they even managed to get a shot off. They bolted down the hallway, Nate doing a quick sweep in one of the offices they passed to make sure no one could sneak up behind them. Around the corner, there were two more, one in the hallway and another just entering the hallway through an office door. Before Cait could even process it, Curie had taken the one on the right, Nate the one on the left.

Was it going to be this efficient the whole time? It wasn't any fun when it was over so quick. But she supposed Nate wasn't here to have fun.

He was starting to get more intense, the faster the beeping on his arm got, the closer they got to the Courser. He had been chasing this thing for a while, and this was just one step in the search to find his son. Nate was getting frustrated, overeager, and sloppy, and Cait was watching it happen.

When the next stairwell let out on the floor above, there was a Gunner in full view in the old men's room ahead of them. Nate shot that one and turned to continue up the stairwell, not bothering to clear the rest of the floor, apparently no longer concerned with making sure no one snuck up behind them. Irked, Cait pulled open the door to the old women's room. Sure enough, there was a Gunner in there, headed for the door and going for his weapon. Curie took him out before Cait even had let go of the door.

"Dammit!" Nate cursed, and then there was a great crashing noise, and the sound of scraping metal. " _Argh_!"

Definitely getting too frustrated. Cait found Nate struggling with some desks and file cabinets the Gunners had piled up in the stairwell, blocking the passage up. Not only was he not going to be able to push five heavy file cabinets, some desks, and a bunch of chairs up a flight of stairs, he was making a lot of noise and attracting attention while he was at it. Cait shot a Gunner that rushed out of one of the offices down the hall and grabbed Nate's arm.

"Come on," she said, "there has to be another way up. They've still got Gunners on these floors, and the wouldn't have cut themselves off from their own reinforcements. They're just tryin' to slow us down."

The only way forward was through the offices the Gunner had come out of. Nate took point through there, taking out another Gunner Cait hadn't even seen, getting ready to fire at them from behind a desk. Cait rushed ahead, and she was the one who found the way up, a collapsed hallway which sloped up to the next level.

"Here we go," she called back, turning through a door onto a walkway across the courtyard.

There was an empty walkway next to her one floor up, and it had been empty when she'd checked it, but as she stepped out into the open, a Gunner with a missile launched leaned out of the doorway onto it, staring her down and priming to fire.

A fuckin' missile launcher. Overkill much?

She saw that barrel and she dove, dove out of the way, dove without thinking. On a walkway with low, decrepit railings several stories in the air. Things all happened very quickly. Cait realized the mistake she'd made, that she'd practically thrown herself off of a building, at the same time the missile launcher fired. She scrambled for purchase, managed to grab the railing with one calloused hand.

Then the missile hit the wall behind her, close enough that the heat of the blast seared her skin and the shock of it caused her to lose her grip. She felt herself begin to plummet.

 _Fuck. Not like this. Not yet._

A burning sound, the creaking of gears.

Cait hit metal - far too soon, and with far too little impact. Mechanical arms curled around her, providing gradual resistance, and Cait fell slowly. It took a good couple of seconds to process that the robot, Curie, was somehow holding her and falling with her. Even then, Cait just stared blankly. Was this real? They reached the ground at a gentle pace.

"Z'ese Gunners should be careful," Curie said indignantly, setting Cait down. "Some of their actions are _illegal_ , I think."

Cait stumbled back a moment, rested her hands on her knees, tried to get her heartbeat to slow.

"How - how the _fuck_ \- " she panted.

She'd been falling. She looked up, at the walkway she used to be standing on, dizzyingly high above them. Saw Nate shoot the bitch with the missile launcher, look down at the two of them on the ground, and continue on without them. How was she alive?

"I saw you fall, Miss Cait. One must be careful with heights, yes? My RobCo jet allowed me to slow our fall, so I vent over after you."

The body of the bitch with the missile launcher hit the ground on the other side of the courtyard with a sickening crunching, squelching noise. She'd fallen off of the railing when Nate had shot her. Her skull was caved in, her back twisted, a pool of blood forming around her. _That could have been me._

Lucky. She'd been lucky. That was it. She'd fallen and she'd gotten damn lucky and she was still alive. That was the only thing Cait could tell herself to get her heart to slow down.

"Think those jets can get us back up there?"

Nate was continuing on without them, and while he was a decent fighter, he was going up against a whole Gunner encampment, and he was making mistakes. Curie flared her booster a little.

"Ah, no. Zey are not that powerful."

"Damn. Stairs it is then," Cait said, straightening a bit, wincing as the burns on her back stretched. She'd had worse burns than these, so she saved her stimpack.

Cait made her way to the body on the other side of the courtyard first, collecting the missile launcher. It was considerably banged up, but probably still usable. She worked a blood-soaked Kevlar satchel containing the missiles for it off of the broken body.

"Shouldn't a coroner be doing zat instead?" Curie asked.

Cait ignored her, slinging the Kevlar bag over her shoulder and stowing her shotgun on the holster on her back. She hefted the missile launcher onto her shoulder, feeling its weight. She didn't mind missile launchers when she was the one shootin' em. Satisfied, she made for the stairwell back up, grimacing to have to climb several stories all over again, even though she knew she should just be happy to be alive at all.

"Miss Cait!" Curie cried after her. "Wait! You should wash your hands after zat. It can be unsanitary to handle the deceased!"

"I've handled a lot worse than that, love," Cait murmured distractedly.

They'd left a trail of destruction in their wake. Between Nate and the Courser, there weren't any Gunners left alive. Cait couldn't trust that, couldn't afford to get sloppy, so they couldn't just rush through the rooms - they had to clear each one, check around the corners before walking into the open, in case there were any survivors. But room after room, there were none. Just bodies.

She hadn't thought too much about the Combat Zone. She'd been in such a hurry to leave, so angry with Tommy. What must it have been like for Tommy once everyone had left? Once he was left alone in a great big theatre full of over a dozen dead bodies? They were leaving far more than a dozen here.

Cait was starting to pick up on which kills were Nate's and which were the Courser's. She'd only been traveling with Nate a day, but she knew he tended to aim center mass. Greater likelihood to hit, and greater likelihood of hitting somethin' important. Cait used a shotgun by a similar reasoning: wide spread, high power, bound to hit something vital. Same with her fists or a baseball bat or anything she did. She wasn't a precision kind of girl. She hit hard, everywhere and anywhere, and counted on at least one of those hits getting through.

The Courser? All headshots.

She'd started to pick up on the pattern, a clean, gruesome burned hole left by a laser rifle in the center of forehead after forehead, almost invariably in the same place. Mechanical accuracy. It was one thing for a sniper, when you had time to line up your shot, but this? This was something else.

Just as Cait was starting to wonder if this building ever ran out of floors, they cleared a room with a working elevator in it. Thank god. She hated stairs. She usually didn't trust elevators, but after all the stories she'd climbed, her legs were shaking and she practically collapsed into it.

As the doors shut and Curie floated in next to her, Cait leaned back against the wall of the elevator. It hurt the burns on her back, and she flinched.

"Are you injured?" Curie asked.

"No," Cait snapped.

Curie seemed to read her tone, and reluctantly backed off. Cait didn't want to tally up any more favors over something as mundane as some minor burns. Favors could be better spent. She'd learned that in the Combat Zone, again and again.

The elevator dinged, announced their floor, and the doors opened.

"You've been following me," Cait heard, through the broken floorboards several stories above.

That was no Gunner. Nate had caught up with the Courser, and they were entering a standoff. Cait didn't like Nate's odds. Not after all those headshots. She stepped out of the elevator running, making for the next set of stairs she saw. Only a few more floors.

She didn't hear their standoff end, but she heard the firefight break out. She sped up.

An explosion. A cry of pain. Nate's.

"You'll die like the rest of them," she heard the Courser say.

Cait rounded the corner, saw Nate prone on the floor, the Courser standing over him. She didn't think. She fired the missile launcher. Center of mass.

The missile caught the Courser in the torso, blasting him against the opposite wall. The dust cleared, and for one terrifying moment, the Courser, his chest caved in and bleeding, stood back up. Took a step towards them, weapon still in hand. Then he fell to his knees, and to the side.

Curie was already injecting Nate with a stimpack on the ground. It seemed like he'd caught some shrapnel, from a grenade probably.

"Damn good timing," he said, nodding to Cait as he got to his feet.

And she could almost hear her own conclusion in his tone. _Lucky_. She didn't call him on it. Saying you'd gotten lucky was easier than admitting someone had saved you. Easier to owe fate than a face. Cait shrugged.

"That Courser was a piece of cake. Hell, I've ended tougher guys in the Combat Zone with me bare hands."

She was lying boldfacedly, but that had never stopped her before. She walked over to the Courser's body, lifting the head up by the hair and peering at it, as though she could see this chip they were talking about. She couldn't.

"Now," she said, turning back to the others, head still in hand, "let's take the chip and find someone that can read the damn thing."

"Miss Cait, we really _must_ talk about ze way you handle corpses."

Cait snorted and dropped the head. She didn't want to be the one to scoop the thing out anyway.


	4. Chapter 4

Finding someone to read the chip was proving considerably more difficult than Cait had anticipated. Sure, she didn't know shit about science, but she knew there were people in the Commonwealth that did. But apparently, this Courser chip was just _so goddamned fancy_ that it was too advanced even for those eggheads.

Curie had been absolutely smitten with the damn thing - _such a wonder! Ze Institute 'as advanced bioengineering to such a degree...so much power contained in such a tiny small chip!_ Cait was about ready to crush it under her boot. Better to come at the Institute head-on, guns blazing, than mess with this 'bioengineering' shite. But since it seemed like teleportation was their only way in, guns blazing or not, Cait kept quiet and tried to tune out the technobabble.

They'd made a brief stop in Goodneighbor to try and see what a scientist named Dr. Amari could do with it. For all the fancy machines with flashing buttons she had set up in her lab, she wasn't much help. Hadn't even tried. Had taken one look at the thing and sent them packing with only a cryptic lead of a codephrase of a group called the Railroad that 'might' be able to help them.

Not a location. A codephrase. "Follow the freedom trail." Useless biddy.

Now they were on a fuckin' scavenger hunt that had started in the Boston Commons, of all places. The Combat Zone had been real close to the Commons, and Cait knew going there was dumb as hell. There were rumors of a super mutant behemoth that liked to lurk about there, nicknamed Swan. But Nate was convinced the "freedom trail" they were supposed to follow referred to some pre-war tourists bullshit that started there. They'd gotten out of the commons without incident, but it had still been a huge risk - with no guarantee of a payout from all this clue-mongering. They'd lost the trail twice in the rubble, not to mention the fact that they had to walk out in the open where they could be ambushed at any minute. Cait could practically feel eyes following their motions, someone laying in wait on the other side of every building.

Scavenger hunts were usually where Cait went ahead and called it a dead end. If she couldn't barrel her way through a task, it wasn't worth doing. But she wasn't the one doing the thinking, so she put up with it, though she didn't bother even trying to help with decoding the weird numbers and letters left on the historical markers. Like she'd said, she was just here to kill things. She kept her weapon ready and loaded.

Nothing beat having a weapon physically attached to you as an arm, though, so Curie got first strike on the ghouls rounding the corner at the top of the stone staircase they were climbing. Damn robots.

Ghouls this feral were usually weak, decrepit, in some deep stage of decomposition, so they weren't hard to kill. The one Curie had hit with a laser round dropped instantly, and Cait bashed the other one's head in with the butt of her shotgun rather than waste ammunition.

"Hold up," Cait said as the ghoul dropped in front of her.

Caution wasn't usually a tool of Cait's, but further down the trail was a big open courtyard with a huge bonfire in the middle of it, and walkin' into that looked like a great way to get killed. Nate pulled up to the old crumbling stone railings just before the courtyard below them, digging out his sniper rifle and peering through the scope. Even without a scope, it wasn't too hard for Cait to spot the two super mutants in the courtyard, and the mutant hound sniffing at a pile of gore by the door of the huge building past it. It was that huge building Cait was worried about. Faneuil Hall, she'd heard it was called, and it was apparently packed with mutants.

"Not many in the courtyard," Cait hissed, "but that building's probably got a couple dozen more inside. If we kill the mutants here quiet and move on quick enough, we might be able to get by without them all comin' out after us."

Nate nodded, pulling his eye away from his scope and gesturing to the side.

"There's another one on the scaffolding to the left, with a missile launcher. If that thing fires, well, it won't be quiet. I can take that one out first with my rifle, but it'll alert the others."

"So me and Saw-Hands McGee get into position first. Got it."

Nate shot her a look. Cait snorted.

"Me and _Curie_. Happy?"

Nate sighed.

"Take that mutt out first. It'll howl."

"Sure, the _dog_ gets to be an 'it,'" Cait muttered.

She padded down the stone stairs towards the courtyard, Curie drifting along beside her. While Cait was grateful for Curie's booster jet since, well, she would have been dead without it yesterday, it wasn't made for stealth. They wouldn't remain hidden in this position for long. Quickly, Cait slipped a needle of Psycho out of her bag, injected just enough to take the edge off. She'd been feeling the shakes for a while, and she wasn't comfortable going into another fight without it.

The robot tilted a little bit, turned towards Cait. It almost seemed like a gesture of concern.

"Miss Cait," the robot said at a very quiet volume, "zat is a _most_ dangerous chem to be - "

Cait put her finger to her lips. Curie seemed to recognize that a bunch of super mutants would kill them both quicker than Psycho would, and drew back into her position. Out of spite, Cait injected a little more, the rest of the needle. Her pupils dilated, the colours around her sharpened. Damn, that felt good.

A shot fired, a sniper rifle. That was their que.

Cait burst out from the stairs, firing a blast into the mutant hound before it could get up from where it curled on the ground by the bonfire. Curie started firing laser rounds into the super mutant to their right, and Cait took the one on the left, which charged her with a sledgehammer.

Not many things could take a shotgun blast to the face, but super mutants were known for their tough skin. Cait's gun was a double-barrel, and she'd used both of her chambered rounds now. She rolled under the mutant's swing, coming to a kneeling position on the other side and reloading from the ground. The super mutant turned just in time for her to snap her barrel back into place and point upwards, letting another round loose into its face, point-blank. A shower of gore descended on her from above.

Cait heard a high-pitched scream.

She got to her feet, shoving the super mutant to the side as it fell towards her, just in time to see a super mutant toss aside a mechanical arm that was supposed to be attached to Curie.

 _Shite_. Cait fired her next round at the super mutant's back. It didn't do much besides piss it off - this wasn't point blank, and it was the tougher, well-armored back, not a face. The mutant turned on Cait, its features twisted and angry, snorting out a disgusting breath she could smell from where she was standing. Curie fired another laser round into its back, but it didn't even seem to notice.

Cait was furiously reloading. Maybe she should have found cover first, higher ground, rather than rely on reloading fast enough. But if she ran, would the super mutant turn to finish off Curie first?

Cait got her weapon up just in time to catch the super mutant in the gut with the barrel, hard enough to wind it, even past that tough exterior. She took a step towards it, forcing it back with an incredible, chem-fueled strength, just to establish dominance, before she fired.

"Loved wipin' the floor with ya," Cait said, shoving the teetering mutant over with the toe of her boot and walking over to fetch Curie's arm. It was the one with a saw on it. Guess Cait couldn't call her 'saw-hands' anymore. It also meant Curie's only defense was the laser arm now, and she wouldn't be able to defend herself very well in close quarters. "We gonna be able to fix this?"

"I, ah," Curie said, spinning a little off-kilter now, "I may require mechanical assistance."

Nate finally caught up with them from his position at the railings.

"Curie!" he panted. "Are you alright?"

"Ze damage is repairable," Curie said.

Cait folded the dismembered limb up and tossed it a little haphazardly into her bag. She still felt so _energized_ from the Psycho, rearing for the next fight. She was turning to call the others impatiently onwards, when she caught sight of someone darting around the corner behind them.

Cait brought her weapon up, taking her stance. That hadn't been a mutant. Black skin, silver hair, shaved on one side, and definitely tailing them. Dammit, she thought she'd felt eyes on her back.

"We've got a tail," Cait growled. "Female, dark skin, pretty hot. I'd say she's been following us for a while."

Nate reacted to her stance, peering past Cait.

"Think she's a threat?"

"Everythin's a threat."

Nate grunted.

"C'mon," he said. "Best thing we can do is try to lose her in the ruins."

Cait nodded, but remained uncertain. You couldn't judge a book by it's cover, but you could usually guess it's genre, and this woman's cover screamed 'badass.' If she wanted to follow them, Cait was sure they wouldn't lose her that easy.

Nate was already following the red-brick trail into the alley to the right of Faneuil Hall, so Cait hustled to keep up. No sense in waiting out in the open of that courtyard, anyway. At least in the alleyway they were out of sight.

Unfortunately, that alleway let out right into another group of super mutants, twice as large as the last, one of them with a mini-nuke in hand and strapped head to toe with explosives.

 _Fuck_. A suicider. Cait had seen these things run at people and detonate themselves at close range. It wasn't pretty. And she knew from experience that shooting the mutant usually just set off the explosives on them.

"Spread out!" Nate shouted. "Confuse them!"

Cait grimaced, realizing that spreading out meant that the suicider couldn't get all of them in one go, either - just one of them. Cait tried to lead it her way, firing two rounds into the super mutant charging her and throwing a brick from the rubble at the suicider to get it's attention.

"Oi!" she shouted, reloading. "Green-skinned freak!"

There were multiple green-skinned freak in the vicinity, and three of them turned on her, including the suicider. She got two rounds into the one closest, and while it wasn't dead, it did seem to be down. Her hands fumbled reloading, and she only got one round into her shotgun before the next one was on her - at point blank, one round was enough. Two down.

But those two had bought the suicider enough time to get right in front of her. The mutant she had just killed fell away just in time for her to see the suicider towering over her, slamming the mini nuke right down on the top of her head. She could see Curie firing lasers at it. She knew it wouldn't help.

Blinding white light. Ringing. Exploding pain.

For a moment, Cait felt nothing. She floated in infinity.

Then - _fuck_. Holy fucking _hell_ , that _hurt_. She opened her mouth - her still intact mouth - to whimper, to scream - but the Psycho was still in her system. And after the initial shock of it, the rush, the fury, that came with the pain, jolted her system. That opened mouth began to laugh.

Cait's hand closed around a piece of metal - she didn't care what it was. She was going to hit something with it.

She swung, from the ground, with so much blunt force that the blow decapitated the mutant she could barely see towering over her, staring confusedly at the undetonated mini nuke. Cait didn't stop to wonder why it hadn't detonated, if it was a dud, she didn't care. She was flying high, high, higher, and she wanted to _smash_ things. The head rolled under her feet and she thundered forward, teeth gritted, blood flowing down the side of her head, at the next super mutant she saw.

She cracked ribs. She busted skulls. She shattered kneecaps and smashed in faces. _Bam. Crash. Bam._ It was starting to blur together. Had she killed six? Or seven? Then there were none left, and she was spinning around, looking for another target.

" - ss Cait! Miss Cait!"

Cait realized the robot had been calling to her for a while now. Her eyes focused on Curie's hovering, unbalanced form. Right. Curie had lost a limb. And Cait had -

For the first time, it hit home that the mini nuke hadn't gone off. Why hadn't it gone off?

Cait slowly lowered what she was gripping in her hands, a metal baseball bat, covered in blood and filaments and bits of skin. She could see Nate's wide-eyed judgement of her from the far end of the courtyard, how his weapon was held at the ready. Not leveled at her, but ready to. She knew what he was thinking. Unhinged. Crazy. Psycho. A liability.

"Why..." Cait croaked, then fixed her voice. "Why aren't I dead?"

An idle curiosity.

"You mean the mini-nuke?" Curie said. "I disabled it. I directed a concentrated laser round through the center of the compact fusion - "

"Say it so I understand it, Curie."

Curie spun a little uncertainty.

"I - I disabled it."

"Right." Cait nodded a little numbly. "Right."

"Can you see?" Curie asked. "Your head looks...very bad."

"I'm sure it's fine," Cait said.

"I am sure it is _not_."

Curie hovered closer to her, and Cait allowed her to float behind her and examine the top-back corner where the nuke had impacted. It had been disabled, but it had come down full force on the top of her head. That must have been the blinding white light and the ringing.

"Miss Cait," the robot said, slowly, "your skull is caved in. I...I can see your brain. I do not know how you are standing."

 _It's the Psycho._ Cait knew that. But she just shrugged.

"I'm sure it's fine," she said again. "I'm standin', aren't I?"

"I am applying stimpacks," Curie said, already halfway through the action.

Cait didn't feel the injection. It occurred to her that she could feel very little at all. Just the high, the disconnect, like she was flying and no longer grounded in a dying body. She liked it.

Somewhere, in the back of her mind, Cait kept track of how many stimpacks Curie used on her. Because the part of her that wasn't flying knew that she was gonna owe a hefty bill. Stimpacks weren't cheap, and this wasn't Curie's first freebie.

"There," Curie said, "you should - you should _live_ , at least. I shall check the progress after half an hour of rest and - "

"Rest?" Cait snorted. "We're just gettin' started." She nodded to Nate. "You ready to move on?"

Nate seemed to weigh the possibility of Cait dropping dead at any second with the urgency of finding his son.

"You think you can move?"

"Faster than you can."

Nate sighed, but it was a good enough answer for him. Curie followed nervously behind Cait, and Cait knew now that there were eyes on her back - she had the undivided attention of three shifting robot lenses. Creepy, but comforting. Curie monitored the healing on the back of her head.

This baseball bat was really, really growing on Cait. Taking out tough things like super mutants with it was wild, crazy, a rush, but with the greatest of the Psycho high wearing off, it was a bit of a challenge. They found one more super mutant and two more mutant hounds on the trail before it ended at a church, and they weren't as easy to take down as the last seven had been.

Ghouls, however? Half-rotted out shambling corpses with the bone density of saltine crackers? _Crunch_. It was downright fun.

The church was littered with ghouls, and Cait took a minute to circle through and cleared the main chapel. From there, Nate found some catacombs which were apparently a part of this Freedom Trail Cait couldn't give less of a shite about. But there were more shamblers inside them, crawling out of the walls, so she didn't get too bored.

At the end of the catacombs was, in Cait's opinion, the biggest bullshit she had ever seen. Some kind of cypher wheel set into the wall, which Nate and Curie excitedly set about decoding using the numbers and letters they'd gathered on the freedom trail.

"If four was L, - " Nate said,

"And one was R - "

"I think three was - "

"Is the password 'railroad'?" Cait interjected, sarcastic.

To her surprise, Nate stared at her blankly, counting on his fingers and mouthing letters.

"I - you're right."

Cait snorted.

"Really? What a bullshit password. Why bother with the code? It's just the name of the damn organization."

Just went to prove Cait's theory that scavenger hunts were bullshit. Nate put in the password, spinning the wheel around and around in all different directions to spell out 'railroad' and pushing in the emblem in the center. The brick wall pushed itself back, grinding horribly against the bricks above and below it and kicking up dust.

The dust settled, lights came on, and three assholes were staring them down with guns.

Cait went for her shotgun strapped to her back, but Nate threw out a hand, signaling her to stop. She ground her teeth. The one on the left with the minigun, she recognized her. Their tail, who she'd spotted outside of Faneuil Hall. She was definitely the toughest player in the room. Cait could tell from the way she held herself, the way the boy on the far right trembled a bit around his weapon, that the woman who'd followed them was the only real one to watch out for.

The redhead in the center spoke.

"Who the hell are you?"

"How about we all put down our weapons first," Nate tried.

"Until I determine you're not a threat, we'll point our weapons wherever we damned well please."

Oooh, this bitch was trying Cait. She reached again for her weapon, just to prove she could.

"I followed the Freedom Trail looking for the Railroad." Nate said. "I'm not your enemy."

"If that's true, you have nothing to fear. Who told you how to contact us?"

Nate stiffened, and Cait remembered he'd been familiar with Dr. Amari. Old friends, or at least they'd certainly helped each other out once or twice in the past, Cait could guess. He wouldn't give her name up easy. Maybe this is what would turn this confrontation into a firefight.

"I'm not saying," Nate said.

The redhead's eyes narrowed.

"We have very powerful enemies. If you want to deal with us, we require your cooperation. Why are you here?"

Nate didn't beat around the bush.

"I tracked down and killed a Courser in Greenetech Genetics. Now I need help breaking the code on his Courser Chip."

"You have what?" redhead raised her eyebrows. "This is not a joking matter."

Another guy sauntered around the corner. He was unarmed and unarmored, just a plain white t-shirt, blue jeans, and some sunglasses, but now they were outnumbered. It put Cait on edge. It put her even _more_ on edge that this guy seemed so laid-back. You were never that calm in a standoff unless you were either crazy, or completely sure of the outcome. Cait didn't like either option.

"I didn't know we were having a party," sunglasses guy said. "What gives with my invitation? Oh. I see you invited the Courser-killer. Nice."

"Deacon," redhead acknowledged, "you're late. You're saying this intruder actually killed a Courser? Single-handedly? That'd give even Glory a run for her money."

Cait saw the woman on the left, the one with the minigun, react infinitesimally to her name. Glory.

"News flash, boss, this guy is kind of a big deal. If you're done interrogating him, you might want to show this Courser-murdering machine a little courtesy. Hm? Just a thought."

Cait didn't like this guy. Deacon. Not one bit. But Desdemona gauged Nate with a less standoffish demeanor than before, and motioned for the others to lower their guns.

"I owe you an apology," Desdemona said. "Anyone who kills a Courser is good in my book. I'm Desdemona, and I'm the leader of the Railroad."

"Hopefully we can work something out," Nate said.

"What you're asking for puts us in a tricky position - "

"Dez," Deacon interrupted, "we need to let him in. He's got an intact Courser Chip, for god's sake."

"That _violates_ our security protocols."

"To hell with that. He _killed_ a _Courser_. There's no way he's working for the Institute."

Desdemona sighed. She looked tired. Real tired.

Then again, wasn't everyone in the wasteland these days?

"We're letting you into our headquarters," she said. "You're the first outsiders ever to be given this privilege. We'll discuss the details about your chip inside."

"Is there anyone here who could repair a Miss Nanny bot?" Nate asked.

Glory spoke up, nodding her head.

"I can take care of that," she said.

Nate nodded at Cait.

"Wanna give her Curie's arm?"

Cait sighed, supposing a firefight was completely off the table now. Whatever. The Psycho was wearin' off anyway. She grunted, lowering her hand from her weapon and following where Glory motioned them.

The headquarters wasn't much nicer than the rest of the catacombs. They'd set up tables on old crypts and knocked down crumbling brick walls here and there. The whole place felt claustrophobic. Cait didn't like wide open spaces, but she didn't like feeling like the ceiling was gonna cave in on her at any second, either.

Glory pulled a toolbox out of a coffin, and Cait started digging Curie's leg out of her bag. Curie bumped into a brick column as she arrived, a little unbalanced with her missing limb.

"Ooh! Pardon me!" Curie said.

"Didja just apologize to a buncha bricks?" Cait asked.

"I vas apologizing for my lack of composure in _general_. Also to the bricks. I am sorry."

Glory snorted.

"What's your name?" she asked.

"I am a Contagions Vulnerability Robotic Infirmary Engineer, but I am called Curie. Like ze famous pre-war scientist. It is lovely to meet you. What may I call you?"

"They call me Glory," Glory smiled, "the angel of death. But you can just call me Glory. How about you?"

She gestured to Cait. Cait handed her Curie's missing arm.

"Cait."

"Saw some of your work along the trail, Cait." Glory said, beginning to remove and replace some nuts and bolts where Curie's limb attached. "Not bad. For a human, that is."

A chill went up Cait's spine.

"'For a human?' What do you mean?"

"You're a born-in-the-wild human model 1.0. You ain't bad for that model." Glory held Curie's limb up to the place where it attached, twisting it until something _clicked_ and bolting things in around it. "Not in the same league as us synths. But hey, not your fault."

Cait was frozen to the spot. A real-life synth was standing in front of her. Inhuman, and looking every bit indistinguishable from a human. She shivered. But Curie perked up excitedly.

"Wait," Curie said, "You are a synth?"

Glory smiled at her.

"In the artificial flesh. And before you start with all the questions, the only thing I'll say about it is this: all those rumors out there are bullshit. I'm as real a girl as you'll ever meet. The only difference is I bet this one's assembly instructions," she gestured to Cait, "were a hell of a lot more fun."

"You done there?" Cait asked.

She wasn't sure if it was adrenaline or a late effect of the Psycho making her legs itch, but they needed to get out of there. Now.

"About," Glory said, tightening something with a wrench and stepping away. "There. You're good to go, Curie."

"Oh, thank you _very_ much," Curie said, testing out her newly reattached limb.

"Right. Very grateful. Time to go," Cait said, physically dragging Curie back to the stairs leading back to the catacombs.

The antechamber where they'd been held at gunpoint was empty now, with everyone crowded around Nate and his Courser Chip, trying to decode it. Empty enough and deserted enough that Cait took a moment to untighten her chest, to breathe. She didn't have a problem with walking into the lion's den as long as she was allowed to treat the lions like lions. But keeping her weapon stowed and just _trusting_ a bunch of synths not to turn on her at any second?

"Miss Cait, where are we going?" Curie asked. "Is it urgent? I would very much like to ask some questions of the Railroad."

"It's not _safe_ in there," Cait hissed. "Didn't you hear? She's a synth!"

"Yes! Isn't it fascinating?"

"Not everythin's worth it just because it's got to do with science, Curie!" Cait snapped.

Curie seemed to consider for a moment, to weigh Cait's tone.

"No," Curie said. "Though I do love science. I love it because it is my way of helping people, the best way I know how. But the Railroad - truly, they go to such extremes to rescue synths. This is noble, yes? It does not need to be so much about science for me to recognize that. They are helping people, just as I would like to with my science."

"Helping people." Cait laughed, dazed. "Christ, Curie - do you even know what a synth is?"

"Do you?" Curie shot back.

Cait shuddered.

"I've heard the rumors."

"Exactly, Miss Cait. _Rumors_. Perhaps you should develop some faulty audio circuits of your own, if you allow rumors to control your actions."

"I'm not a _fucking_ robot, Curie!" Cait snapped.

Curie drew back, her newly reattached limb drawing closer into her body.

"And there is ze problem, then. You do not think they are helping people, do you? They are helping machines? Well, I would like to think even machines deserve some respect. Unlike you, apparently."

Curie turned on her, headed back into the main headquarters.

"It's your funeral!" Cait called after her.

Her voice cracked. Fuck. Why had her voice cracked? She turned and kicked a brick across the room. She was hurt, she was tired, she was afraid; she was coming down from a huge Psycho high and she was alone, just like always.

Whatever. Curie could ask her damn questions. Cait had all the answers she needed.

This time, the shaking wasn't from the Psycho.


	5. Chapter 5

The next step in Nate's grand plan to fuck up the Institute and get his son back was, apparently, to be a complete dumbass and die. To be clear, that wasn't exactly what he'd said. What he'd said was, "We need to head into the Glowing Sea." Toe-may-toe, toe-mah-toe. And surprisingly, radiation-should-be-avoided-at-all-costs Curie was on board with this. Cait was fine with a few rads here and there, it was just a part of living in the wasteland, but there was a term for waltzing into the Glowing Sea, and that term was suicide.

"Monsieur Nate and I 'ave been before. It was not _so_ bad."

"I had a hazmat suit," Nate clarified, "and Curie doesn't have a problem with rads. I hate to say it, since you're the strongest fighter, but unless you know where we can get another hazmat suit, we may have to leave you behind."

"Hazmat suit or not, I'm not stupid enough to go into the Glowing fuckin' Sea." Those things tore easy, and one hole in the lining was all it would take for the radiation to get in and kill you. "I'll accompany ya to the edge, but that's as far as I'm goin'."

"Fair enough. Whatever you're comfortable with. There's a set of cabins at the edge you could hole up at in the meantime."

"Right," Cait said, swinging her baseball bat in little circles as she walked, feeling out its weight. "And at what point do I decide you're not comin' back and our contract's up?"

"Miss _Cait_ ," Curie said, horrified.

"Two days," Nate said.

"Monsieur!"

It took them the rest of the day to reach the edge of the Glowing Sea, so the plan was for them to spend the night at the cabins, and then for Nate and Curie to head out in the morning, while Cait was stuck sitting around with her thumb up her ass. _Lovely_. Another day walking across the Commonwealth in the blazing heat - eighty-four degrees fahrenheit, twenty-eight degrees celcius today, according to the ever-so-helpful Curie. Another day shooting radroaches and the occasional bloodbug. Yippee.

Sure, every now and then they would engage in firefights that were a little more challenging. There had been two groups of super mutants, and one time they'd encountered a stray group of raiders. But nothing like storming a Gunner fortress chasing after a courser, or taking out a group of super mutants in central Boston with nothing but a baseball bat. Cait needed something like that, something to really get the blood pumping.

And tomorrow promised to be infinitely more boring. Sitting around in a cabin waiting for Nate and Curie to come back? How the hell was she gonna pass the time? Fuck, maybe she could go scavving for some liquor and get blackout drunk, but scavving was always a real fifty-fifty. Maybe she would find something good, maybe all she would find was a pile of tin cans and some radroaches.

They made camp in one of the cabins by the edge of the Glowing Sea. Nate and Cait laid out their bedrolls inside the cabin, and then Cait got started setting up a campfire just off the porch. Their haul was a little more interesting today. They'd taken down a few stingwings, and Cait had tied their tails together and tied them to the side of her bag. Stingwing meat wasn't bad, as far as insect meat went, and you could make a decent fillet out of it.

"You two 'ave eaten nothing but meat for many days," Curie pointed out as the stingwing meat sizzled over the fire. "Humans require a more balanced diet than this, yes?"

"Curie," Cait said, "are you telling me I need to eat more vegetables?"

"I think it would be wise."

Cait was about to poke fun at that further, but Curie turned away, and the taunt died in Cait's throat. Things had been different since the Railroad. Curie tolerated Cait, but that was it. There wasn't going to be any playful banter between them.

Well, who the hell cared, anyway? Cait didn't need the approval of anyone, let alone a Miss Nanny robot. There was a small, weak part of her that always wanted approval, always reached out for that, and she had to remind herself to shove that shit down. It would only get her hurt.

"Seems weird that there's only two cabins here," Cait said, striking a conversation with Nate instead. "Think there were more?"

She was casting about for a good place to scavenge tomorrow.

"Might be a part of a larger complex?" Nate said. "I'm not sure. There's a park nearby, the Robotics Pioneer Park, they might be associated with that, but it's not super close."

Curie reacted to that, suddenly spinning around.

"The Robotics Pioneer Park!" Curie said, her mechanical arms perking up. "Please, we must go. It is a monument to one of my creators."

Nate shook his head.

"That's not a casual trip. There's a deathclaw holed up in there. I took out a deathclaw once in Concord, but I had a full suit of power armor and a minigun. Even then, it was close. I don't think it's wise to try sightseeing there."

Even Cait wasn't sure she wanted to take on a deathclaw tonight. She'd tangled with them before, and their claws were worth a fair penny once you killed the damn thing, but like Nate had said. It had been close.

Nate and Curie left at sunrise the next morning, and Cait, who was not a morning person, hadn't bothered to wish them goodbye. She'd skipped her dose of Psycho last night, hoping that getting blackout drunk would suffice. She found a fair stash of liquor in the next cabin over, too. Half a bottle of vodka and a full bottle of rum. There were some other things, too, a box of pre-war Dandy Boy (TM) apples and a tin of mentats. She threw them into her bag, but she was really only interested in the alcohol.

So by eight in the morning, she was smashed.

Being drunk was nice, as long as she was alone. If she wasn't alone, it could be tricky. Drinking was another fifty-fifty. Sometimes she would get violent and boisterous and show off - that was the drunk Cait that Cait preferred. But sometimes she would get sad and defensive and talk too much. Which was fine, as long as no one was there to listen, and use it against her later. Cait was grateful for the solitude. It was necessary. She wouldn't be able to be this drunk if she weren't alone.

Which is why she surprised herself by saying, to the open air:

"I'm lonely."

Well, there she went, talking too much and saying things she'd never want anyone else to hear. She was lonely and she was grateful for being alone.

And hey, she was smashed enough to do something stupid about it.

She went scavenging in the other cabin again, and found an old miniature globe. Complete, total junk, not made out of anything valuable, not worth the space it would take to carry. It was perfect.

From the small kitchenette, she scooped up a handful of rusty forks, and sat cross-legged on the ground. One by one, she stabbed the globe with the sharp ends of three of the forks in a ring at the bottom, angled so that she could prop it up and have it stand on its own.

"It's Curie," she declared, hiccuping. "Tah-dah."

The globe said nothing back.

"Hey, look," Cait slurred, "I'm Curie, and it's eighty-five degrees outside. I'm Curie, and it's not eight o'clock, it's not nine o'clock, it's eight thirty-seven _exactly_. This has been time and temperature with yours truly, Contagious Vulnerable Robo Itch Egg. Or something like that."

Hmm. There was just enough sobriety left for Cait to kind of realize what she was doing, and judge herself for it. She drowned that bitch in vodka.

"Hey, look," Cait continued, after chugging half of what remained of the vodka, "I'm Curie, and I'll judge you for using Psycho. I'm Curie, and I know that you're a no-good trash junkie. Of course I don't respect you, you fucking _junkie_ \- but you have to respect me. Don't you _dare_ disrespect me. I'm not like _you_ , lowlife junkie _trash_ \- "

But Curie wasn't saying those things. Cait was. She was the only one there.

"Miss Cait," Cait mocked, imitating Curie's French accent. "Miss Cait, MissCaitMissCaitMiss _Cait_ \- "

She threw up into an old trash bin by the kitchenette.

Her hands were shaking. _Fuck_. Her hands wouldn't stop fucking shaking, and while she was smashed enough to do a lot of things, there wasn't a 'smashed enough' to escape this need, this craving that wracked her from head to toe. She was sweating, shaking, her tongue numb in her mouth.

Fuck it.

Cait dug out two needles of Psycho, and injected them both in full. The relief was instantaneous. The colours were right again, her bones didn't feel like they were falling apart anymore. She felt solid. Invulnerable. No one could hurt her like this, she was made of iron, impenetrable, undefeatable. It didn't matter _what_ Curie or anyone else thought of her. There were no manacles on her wrists, no collar on her neck, nothing in her way that she couldn't obliterate.

Cait stood, hollering, whooping. Yes. _Yes_. This was it. This was what she wanted, always, she wanted to always feel like this. She kicked globe-Curie across the room with the steel toe of her boot, and the globe cracked open against the wall, the forks falling out onto the floor. _Yes_.

Oh, she knew exactly what she was gonna do with her day.

Fighting deathclaws was always, well, close. But that was what she wanted right now. What she _needed_. Close. And part of her knew that, as much as she wanted to always feel like this, that she wouldn't. Part of her knew she was going to come down, that she was going to lose the high, and she was going to return to a body made of flesh and bone and sinew, a vulnerable body that was going to die in a horrible, horrible way. Coughing up blood was never a good sign.

So, well, if the deathclaw won? It was better to die in a body made of iron, anyway.

She didn't bring her gun. She didn't bring her baseball bat. She brought the last of the vodka and a leftover stingwing fillet. Fuck vegetables.

The Robotics Pioneer Park was a couple of cabins around a lake, with a creepy old tree in the center of it. Cait didn't pay too much attention to it. She was here to find a deathclaw.

"Come on, beastie," she taunted, swigging back the vodka. "I've got somethin' for ya!"

She swung around the stingwing fillet, then frowned. Maybe the fact that it was cooked was actually _unattractive_ to the deathclaw. They usually ate their meat raw.

"Come on out, motherfucker!" Cait called again.

She peeked her head inside of one of the cabins. It had a lot of techno-bullshit in it, some protectrons in their pods. No deathclaw. Fully stocked cigarette machine, though. Cait made note of that.

The next cabin was definitely home to a deathclaw. The back of the cabin was smashed open to the outside, and there was dirt and trash littering the ground like a nest, and the torn-open carcass of a brahmin, flies buzzing around it.

"I know you're here!" Cait shouted, spinning around. "Come on out, you little _bitch_ \- "

A large, clawed hand suddenly closed around Cait, yanking her backwards out of the cabin.

The deathclaw had been on the roof. The goddamned roof. And she had been to drunk or high to notice.

It lifted her into the air, roaring into her face with that distinctive, earth-shaking roar only deathclaws had, then slammed her into the roof beneath them. It drew back its other hand, claws extending, preparing to rip her to shreds.

Game on.

Cait threw her vodka bottle into its face, with enough force that it shattered right in its eyes, pieces of glass getting stuck in its eyeballs. Cait shielded her face against the rain of glass, and the deathclaw screamed, its hand releasing Cait in shock. She got to her feet and slugged it in the nose. She felt her knuckles break with the force of her own swing.

She loved it.

The deathclaw was stumbling backwards, clawing at its own eyes. It's feet were dangerously close to the edge of the roof. Cait saw the opportunity, and backed up a few steps, then ran at the beast, bodychecking it, using all of her momentum to knock it _just_ off balance enough.

It wasn't far to fall, from the roof of a single-story cabin, but the deathclaw couldn't see, and it landed poorly. The sound of its large leg cracking echoed off of the slopes around them. It swiped at her, blindly, and Cait rolled out of the way to avoid most of the swing, only taking a single small scratch to her jaw. She stumbled backwards, orienting herself, and the deathclaw rolled to its feet, heavily favouring its right leg over the mangled dead weight of its left leg.

"That's right, _bitch_ ," Cait screamed at it. "Come at me!"

The deathclaw didn't back down from the challenge. It charged her, head down, and Cait charged it. As they met, Cait leaped upwards, the Psycho giving her legs the strength to jump a couple feet higher than she might usually be able to, and her legs were strong. Her hands closed around the deathclaw's horns.

It continued charging, having expected to crash into her, and she was pulled along for the ride, gripping the horns more securely now. After a moment, it seemed to realize where she was, and roared, shaking its head to knock her off.

There wasn't really anything vulnerable up here. Nothing good to attack. The eyes were probably it's weakest point, or if you could get a shot in the back of its throat, but the skin up here was tough, and Cait knew the moment it knocked her off she was dead meat. How could she kill it from here? Before it killed her?

The horns. One of the toughest, most dangerous parts of the deathclaw, along with its teeth and claws. She gripped one in each hand. And pulled.

It was insane, improbable. There was no way she could actually pull the horns off of its head. But she was on a shitton of Psycho, completely smashed, and she didn't care if she lived or died. So she pulled.

The deathclaw screamed, swiping a clawed hand up near where Cait was. But it was a tough spot to reach, and Cait easily dodged it. She started pulling again, bracing her feet against the back of the deathclaw's head and putting all her weight and strength into the motion, her muscles straining against her skin as though they wanted to burst free.

The horns ripped off, taking skull and brain with them.

Cait tumbled backwards, off of its back and onto the ground. She hit the dirt hard, her head spinning. If it pounced now, it would probably get her.

It didn't.

After a moment standing, lifeless, the deathclaw faceplanted into the dirt, in the opposite direction from Cait. Cait spread her arms out on the ground, catching her breath, staring at the horns still in her hands.

She was supposed to feel better now. She'd gotten high, fucked with something bigger than her. The emptiness, the craving, the pain, it was all supposed to go away.

"Miss Cait," Cait imitated again, in her shitty French accent. "MissCaitMissCaitMissCait."

Cait got up, a little unsteady, and found her way back over to the first cabin she'd looked in on. It had seemed science-y. Robotics Pioneer Park. _Please, we must go. It is a monument to one of my creators._ Curie had seemed pretty excited about it. Cait wondered if there was anything left to be excited about.

Curie would probably be pretty giddy over these robots. Whatever they were. And there was a terminal at the back. If Cait could unlock that terminal, maybe...but Cait wasn't good at terminals, or science, or any of that shite. Why bother trying? She didn't need anyone's approval.

But, well...she did have a tin of mentats in her bag.

Being high on mentats, Cait discovered, was the worst kind of high she could possibly imagine. She got high so she didn't _have_ to think. The mentats? They were all about thinking. Cait wanted to throw up. But at least she could focus it. After a couple of sickening minutes where the drug ran wild with her, making her think about her life and her problems and her fucked-up future, she managed to focus the drug's energy on hacking the computer terminal. She had no clue how to do that, but once she got the logic puzzle figured out, the drugs seemed to connect the dots for her.

By the time Nate and Curie returned, everything had worn off. The liquor, the Psycho, the mentats, the rush of the fight. Even the small bit of stimpack she'd applied to her broken hand and the cut on her jaw. She was back in the original cabin they'd set up camp in, packing both her and Nate's stuff. There was no way they were spending a second night here. She'd go mad.

Cait could hear Nate and Curie arguing before she saw them. They approached the cabin, Curie sometimes getting in Nate's way to stop his path, just to have Nate brush by her.

"Monsieur Nate, you _heard_ Monsieur Virgil. He cannot guarantee zat the device will work. He worked in _bioscience_ , not engineering. Do you understand how very different zese two fields are?"

"He felt confident enough to draw up the plans, Curie. I trust him."

"Zis is not about trust, Monsieur Nate! Zis is a machine which will attempt to break you down to a molecular level, and then reassemble you in ze Institute - you _must_ be sure of its integrity."

"This isn't a discussion, Curie. It's the next step, and the only way I have of getting into the Institute."

"But Monsieur - "

And Curie just seemed so damn _worried_. She was always like that, though. Always trying to help, always offering a stimpack whenever you needed it. Even when she'd seen Cait inject Psycho, she hadn't chastised her - she had warned her. And now, as she was hovering around Nate, trying to talk him out of using this dangerous half-cocked idea for a teleporter, it was almost like she expected him to listen. Naive, maybe. So determined to save people who didn't really give a shite about being saved.

Nate didn't care if he died. He just wanted to find his son. Cait? Her motives were simpler. She just wanted to get high and forget, whatever the price.

Curie...she deserved better.

"I've got a better place for us to camp tonight," Cait eventually said, when it was clear to Curie that Nate wasn't going to budge.

"Is there something wrong with this site?" Nate asked.

"Nah. But I've got a better place." Cait shifted, a little uncomfortable. She wasn't good at 'better.' "Follow me."

She led them over the rough ground under the crumbling highway overpass, then they hit the paved road again. Nate tensed up, quieted, as they neared the parking lot for the park. Wary of the deathclaw. Cait led them right through that parking lot, making for the stairs into the park.

"Cait, hold up," Nate said, grabbing her arm. "Didn't you hear me yesterday? There's a deathclaw in that park."

Cait shook him off.

" _Beeeeeeeep_ ," she said.

Nate came to a complete halt, rightfully baffled. Cait fought to keep her cheeks from flushing red, fought to keep her resolve.

"Cait, what the - "

" _Beeeeeeeep_." Cait couldn't make a static noise with her mouth. She just couldn't. This was the best she could do. "Me audio circuits are malfunctioning. I think I'll do whatever the fuck I please. _Beeeeeeeep_."

Nate didn't look like he understood what was happening any better; in fact, he looked even more confused. But Cait wasn't looking at Nate, she was looking at Curie. Trying to discern some kind of facial expression from a robot that didn't have a face. It shouldn't be possible. But Curie? Cait couldn't be sure if she was imagining it, but she looked intrigued, at least.

"Um, Cait?" Nate asked.

Cait ignored him, and continued walking up the stairs. Nate followed at a distance, gun drawn, but Curie floated up behind Cait without reservation.

The lake, the grand old elm tree in the center of it, looked less ominous in the clear daylight like this. The brick pathway running around the water, the benches at various intervals alongside it, was quaint, if you ignored the two hundred year old skeletons still sitting, posed, on those benches.

"Ah! Zis park...it seems zere is not much left," Curie said in disappointment.

It was true. The bricks were crumbling, the picnic tables had rotted out, and all but two of the cabins had collapsed entirely.

"There's one thing left," Cait said.

They made their way around the lake, and Cait tried to ignore the way the skeletons seemed to stare at her out of empty eye sockets from the benches. Nate slowly seemed to realize that the area was clear, that there was no deathclaw here anymore. Maybe Cait could have told him she'd killed it, but eh. She was sure he'd figure it out on his own.

Cait led Curie into the cabin with the terminal, and the four protectron pods. She was suddenly struck by a fear - what if the terminal had reset to being locked? There was no way Cait could get back into it without mentats. She'd look like a real jackass if she'd dragged everybody all the way here and didn't have anything to show for it.

Thankfully, her fear was unfounded. She got into the terminal without incident, and the controls weren't too complicated, even for her. Just one button. PROTECTRONS ON PARADE. Cait hit enter.

Everyone jumped as the protectron pods opened with a mechanical _hiss_ , and Nate leveled his weapon cautiously at the one closest to him. Cait held out her hand. Unless she'd royally fucked up, they shouldn't be hostile. Shouldn't.

The protectrons filed slowly out of the cabin door, onto the porch, towards the stage next to the cabin overlooking the lake. They seemed to show no interest in Nate, Cait, or Curie.

"How marvelous!" Curie said, realizing what the protectrons were doing as they mounted the stage. "Is this a display?"

"A parade," Cait said grudgingly.

"A parade! And just as ze sun is setting. We should watch!"

"I'll make camp in the other cabin," Nate said as Curie practically bolted down to the lakeside. "You sure that deathclaw isn't coming back?"

"I'm sure," Cait said, brushing past him.

Nate looked unconvinced, but Cait ignored it. If he was making camp in the other cabin, he'd find the dead deathclaw just outside of it. That would set his mind at ease.

Curie was practically gasping in delight as the robots walked right off of the front of the stage, landing sturdily on the ground and beginning their march around the brick pathway. Cait made her way to one of the benches, clearing the skeletons haphazardly from them and tossing them into the bushes. Rest in peace, and all that.

She took a seat, leaning back and stretching out her injuries. It wasn't the comfiest seat, an old wooden bench that dead bodies had been rotting on for two hundred years, but it was a place to sit. A view of the sunset and a parade. And Curie seemed happy. It wasn't the worst.

At length, Curie drifted over next to her, hovering companionably by the bench while Nate shuffled around in the cabin, setting up bedrolls and getting a fire together. The sun was almost completely set now, and you could see the moon peeking out past some stray clouds.

"I 'ave a funny feeling," Curie said after a while, "zat you are trying to apologize to me."

"I dunno what you're talkin' about."

A silence fell over them as they watched the multicoloured protectrons march around the lake, the light from their various electronic facets reflecting in the irradiated water, the sparking defibrillator hands of the medic protectron, the flashing safety light of the utility protectron. It was beautiful, in a shitty, post-war kind of way.

"I like how ya call me 'Miss Cait,'" Cait said, finally. "Ain't nobody ever called me _Miss_ Cait. Bitch-Cait, Psycho-Cait, Mean-Cait, sure. But never Miss Cait."

"It is nothing, Miss Cait. A little respect is not so much to ask for. I am sorry you have seen so little before now."

Cait sighed. Respect. Right.

"I'm not...apologizin,'" Cait said, and she tried to run a hand through her hair, to sort out her thoughts, but it got caught in the tangles and she gave up. "I'm not sayin' sorry, so don't give me credit for that when I ain't done it yet. But I am gonna try to be better. A little respect isn't so much so ask for, after all, right? Miss Curie?"

It felt weird coming out of her mouth. Miss. She'd never called anyone Miss or Mister or Missus before. Curie seemed to gauge her a little differently, drifted a little closer. Cait could feel the heat from the booster beneath her. Not too hot, not searing, just pleasantly warm, and smelling slightly of gasoline.

"Well thank you very much, Miss Cait," Curie said, "but I think to my friends I can be just 'Curie.'"

"Curie. Right," Cait said. "Does that mean I'm 'Cait' now? If we're friends?"

"But, you just told me that you liked 'Miss Cait.' That no one had ever called you that before."

"Nobody ever called me 'friend,' neither. Think I'd like that, too."

"Very well. Cait, then." Then, quietly, as though sharing a secret: "And, I accept your apology."

And damn, that twisted something in Cait's heart. The relief of being forgiven, accompanied by the knowledge that she didn't deserve it. Hadn't earned it. That Curie was willing to give it anyway. It was beautiful, in a shitty, broken kind of way.

The robots shuffled to their strange parade on the other side of the lake.


	6. Chapter 6

Nate was dead.

That's where Cait was placing her money, anyway. There was a betting pool going around Sanctuary on it. Cait had started it. She hadn't expected everyone in Sanctuary to be a such a goddamn sucker, though. Everyone was betting against her out of - get this - loyalty, to Nate. _Loyalty_. Like loyalty made any difference after seeing a man get blasted by lightning in a shuddering, scrapped together death machine. There was a pile of ash in the center of it. RIP Nate.

But these fuckers? They were willing to take those odds. It was downright funny.

Preston Garvey, he had greeted them a week ago when they'd first gotten into Sanctuary. Ex-Minutemen guy. Well, not that he'd term it as 'ex-Minutemen' if you asked him. But everyone knew the Minutemen were done for since Quincy.

Garvey refused to let them die graceful, though. He was trying to rebuild the minutemen from the ground up out of the small settlement they had up in Sanctuary, and apparently he'd asked Nate to be the new Minutemen General a while back. Nate had even been interested, if you listened to the rumors, but he had a one-track mind right now. _After I find Shaun_ , he'd told Garvey.

Anyway, Garvey had been the first one to take Cait up on her bet. She guessed he had the most to lose, if Nate didn't come back. Well, now he had all that to loose, plus the fifty caps he'd put up.

Jun Long had been next, strangely enough. Jun was always sullen, morose, out of it. Cait hadn't even thought he'd been paying attention. But while Preston defiantly shoveled out fifty (kind of dirty) caps into the pot, Jun had left, gone to his house, and returned with an old beat up lunchbox full of caps. He was in for fifty as well.

Sturges bought in next. _I built the thing, I know what I'm doing. Mostly. I'm sure it worked fine._ A piece of metal had fallen off of the radar dish as he'd been speaking, but he'd put in fifty anyway.

It seemed everyone in Sanctuary was shoveling out. Mama Murphey, some ghoul who said he used to work for Vault-Tec, and a guy named Sheffield. Even Codsworth and Curie were in for Nate, despite all the doubts Curie had initially had about the machine, begging Nate not to use it. Marcy Long was the only one who declined to enter. And after Mama Murphey declared she 'knew' Nate was alive, everyone else pitched another twenty-five caps into the pot.

Mama Murphey claimed she could see the future when she was high on Jet. Hell, Cait could see more impressive things than the future when she got her hands on Jet inhalers. She couldn't believe these Sanctuary locals all believed her shite.

In total, the pot was six-hundred and seventy-five caps. Hell yeah.

She'd have to wait for it, of course. It would be a while until these assholes admitted Nate was dead. But she was willing to wait for that much money. With odds like these, she wasn't one to complain.

Well, she wouldn't complain about waiting for the money. The waiting in general though? That much was fair game.

"Don't look at me that way, you dirty little mole rat," Cait snapped at the dog whining at her feet.

She was sure Dogmeat would have put money in the pot for Nate, too, if it could. Thing was damn loyal. Went and sat at the pile of ashes every day, waitin' for Nate to come back. When it wasn't beggin' for scraps, that is.

"This is _my_ Brahmin jerky, ya filthy mutt. _Mine_."

Dogmeat just cocked his head like it didn't know what Cait was talking about. Funny. He seemed to understand orders from Nate just fine. Cait looked both ways to make sure no one was looking, then leaned in a little. She'd seen Dogmeat do this for Nate a couple of times during the week it had taken to build the machine that had killed him.

"How about a trade, eh mutt? Jerky for some ammo?" She dug a shell out of her pocket, holding it out to the dog and letting him sniff it. "It's gotta be shotgun shells though, alright? Go find ammo, boy!"

Dogmeat sniffed the shotgun shell, then sat down, tongue hanging out and staring at Cait. Waiting for something.

"Christ. Payment up front? Fine."

Cait tossed Dogmeat a strip of jerky. His ears perked up, and he bounded off, pouncing on the jerky and giving it a death shake before happily gobbling it down.

"You'd better come back with ammo, or I'll reach down your gullet and reclaim that jerky with my bare hands, mutt, I swear to Christ," Cait muttered.

"Fascinating," a voice said, and Cait jumped practically out of her skin, "the bond between human and animal."

"Curie," Cait said, half guiltily. That had been a rather vivid threat she'd just been delivering to a dog. "I didn't hear you come up."

"Robco motors are very quiet. Zey are built for ze modern home!"

"Right," Cait said, looking around, "the modern home."

The old ruins of a house she'd set up in in Sanctuary had been someone's idea of a modern home, once. Cait sure wasn't using it the way it had been intended, though. There was hole left in the wall of one of the bedrooms by the war, and so Cait had boarded up the door to that bedroom, closed it off from the rest of the house, and hung a curtain in front of the hole in the wall instead. It had more privacy that way. Only way in was through the back of the house, and she could hang out in the backyard and drink as much as she liked. There were three bottles of bourbon scattered around her feet now. Whenever she ran out, she went down to Concord to scavenge more. She was running low, now. Down to just some cheap beer.

"I 'ave not seen you today, Cait. Is everything alright?"

No, it wasn't. Cait didn't answer, leaning back against the wall and finishing her beer. Dogmeat came back, dropping an orange and teal packet of cardboard down at her feet. _Buckslayer Sure Shot_. Shotgun shells. She picked them up, turned them over.

"Good dog," she said.

Dogmeat had paid up. It was damn near time Cait did, too.

"Have a minute?" she asked Curie. "Got somethin' on my mind."

"For you, I have time," Curie hummed.

Cait sighed. Where to begin?

"I know...I know I ain't been good to you, Curie. I'm used to pushin' people away, and I'm used to 'em pushin' right back. Now so far, you've been treatin' me like a friend. Hell, you've been damn near nice to me. Now I don't mean to sound ungrateful, but your kindness is startin' to make me wonder." Cait opened the little flap of the cardboard box of shells, closed it again. "If there's anythin' I learned at the Combat Zone, it was that nobody does things for other people without expectin' somethin' in return."

Curie hovered closer to her, like she had that night at the Robotics Pioneer Park. The strangely comforting gasoline-smelling warmth of her engine. For the modern home.

"Ze Combat Zone...zis sounds like it was a terrible place to have to survive." Curie said, after a moment.

"That's puttin' it nicely." Cait ran her fingers through her hair, managing to brush through the knots this time. "I spent three years livin' at the Combat Zone. Smelled like puke and piss, but I called it home. I was makin' a few caps, had me own bed to sleep in and three hot meals a day."

It hadn't been half bad. Especially considering what life had been like before that. It hadn't been a good time in her life, but maybe it had been the best time in her life.

"Then," Cait said, because there was always a 'then,' "then the Raiders took over the place. You know that lot... they aren't exactly what you'd call the gentle type. After they moved in, if you didn't keep lookin' over your shoulder, you were liable to get sucker punched and robbed... or worse. Didn't take me long to learn that I had to put my hard-earned caps to good use. Buyin' friends was essential to makin' life easier. So I guess..."

Cait put the shells down, finally, focusing on Curie. Making eye contact with the center one of her three lenses.

"So I guess I'm waitin' for you to hand me a bill," Cait said, "you know what I mean?"

Curie didn't answer for a moment. Cait tried again to discern facial expression from her metal exterior.

"A bill?" Curie finally said, her tone a little strangled. "Cait, I do not think friendship works zis way."

"Maybe not usually in so many words, but that's always what it comes down to, ain't it? What's owed? And I can't go any longer without us having this conversation, Curie. As long as I'm still on tab, I'm losin' my mind."

Curie backed away a little, began moving around somewhat aimlessly. If Cait didn't know any better, she might say she was pacing.

"Cait," Curie said, "Cait, why are you so fixated on this idea of debt?"

Cait huffed a bitter laugh. Yeah, she supposed people were usually fine with freebies. But Cait had learned the hard way that nothing was ever free. Just coated in pretty thoughts, sometimes. Pretty words. Like 'friend.' Or 'lover.'

"It was kind of my fault," Cait admitted. "Got close to a guy named Stratton while I was there... thought we really had somethin' goin'. One night we had a fight cause I wouldn't hop in the sack with him. Our fight got pretty bad... nothin' physical, just a whole lot of yellin'. So I get pissed off, and I leave. I get outside and a bunch of Raiders start pushin' me around, givin' me shite. Stratton walks out, looks at me and says, "Next time you'll think twice before walkin' out on me." Fucker left me there. I got beat up pretty good that night. That's when I learned that nobody does favors for free."

"Zat...mon dieu, Cait, zat was not your fault. None of zat - "

"Yer missin' the point," Cait said, frustrated. "I need ta know, Curie. I need ta know what my tab is. Before I accidentally walk out on you, and don't realize the consequences. Alright?"

"I am very sorry this has happened to you, Cait. But I am not your Stratton. You do not owe me a thing."

"Whatever," Cait said, tossing her empty beer bottle across the yard.

It just meant more not knowing. More waiting. More losin' her mind.

Curie seemed to be able to read that attitude off of her. After all, Cait had a face, with a full range of facial expressions. She couldn't be as hard to read as Curie with her metal chassis.

"I wish," Curie said, "I wish I could convince you I do not expect anything from you. I wish...I wish I 'ad not come here today to ask a favour."

Cait's head snapped up.

"A favour, Cait. Not a bill. I need your help...but, it is a very strange request."

This was more in Cait's language. She reached for an unopened beer, popped the cap off with her teeth.

"I'm listenin'," she said.

"I...well, the short version is, I need accompaniment to Goodneighbor. Combat is, uh, not my primary purpose. Without help, I doubt I vould arrive in one piece."

"Goodneighbor, eh? Not gonna wait for Nate every day like that damn dog?" Cait said, wagging her eyebrows.

"You know vere my money is," Curie said. "I 'ave faith he will return. But in the meanwhile I do not intend to, how is it you say it? 'Sit around with my thumb up my ass?'"

Cait snorted. Curie said the phrase haltingly, with emphasis on each word. And she didn't think she'd ever heard the word 'ass' with that questioning tone at the end of it. When Curie said it, the phrase almost sounded polite.

"Alright," Cait said, "so what's the long version? Why do you need to get to Goodneighbor?"

Goodneighbor was Cait's kind of town. Curie's? Not so much.

"Ze long version...I have spent much effort, gathering information in my travels so far. And my self-diagnostics have come to a grim conclusion. It is not lack of data or lack of collaboration which stifles my scientific progress. The inescapable truth is there has never been a great robot scientist."

The hell did that have to do with Goodneighbor?

"Fukin so?" Cait asked.

"So? So, my purpose is to study disease, virus, and other contagions, and either prevent or curb their ravages. And I am thwarted by my own incapabilities. The greatest scientific minds of history, the Einsteins and the Curies, my namesake, have had something beyond raw data analysis capabilities. They have had a spark. This elusive inspiration is something I must possess."

Spark. Right. Whatever the hell that was. Cait didn't bother to ask.

"So, how are you gonna...do that?"

If she was looking for scientific inspiration, she sure wasn't gonna find it in Goodneighbor.

"I believe zat Doctor Amari can help me. I saw her download Kellog's digital memories into Nate's human brain, in order to unearth Kellog's information on the Institute, after he was dead. If she was able to do zat, perhaps she can..." Curie paused, seemed to brace herself. "If I am to advance my understanding of medicine in this strange world, I must embark on a great adventure. I must become human, or as close as I can. I must find a way to download all that I am into a human brain."

A beat of dead silence. Cait stared at Curie, waiting for the punchline to land. Maybe Cait hadn't gotten the joke. There had been a lot of technospeak in there, after all. Cait took a swig of her beer, sloshing it around in her mouth for a moment.

Curie wasn't joking.

"That's...wow. That's the _worst_ fuckin' idea I've ever heard."

"Cait, please! I have thought long and hard about this. I really think it is what would be best for science!"

For science? Really?

"Curie, do you have any idea what it's like to be human?"

To cough up blood in private when no one was looking? To drown shitty memories in booze and drugs just to get through the day? To go to bed every night with this fuckin - _certainty_ , that you were worth nothing, and never would be? That's what it was to be human.

"No," Curie said, "but I imagine the experience will be invaluable to my research. Inspiration!"

"Christ," Cait said. "Trust me, Curie, you don't want this. The human body? Shite. The human mind? Double shite."

"Zat is easy for you to say. You are human already!"

"I'd give it up in a second," Cait said.

No human body, no bloody human lungs. No human mind, no haunted human memories.

"You really think so? There's nothing you'd miss? Nothing at all?"

"There's only one thing I'd miss about being human," Cait said, raising her right hand and flipping the bird. "The ability to do this."

"Ah! Zat gesture is considered rude, no?"

"Yeah, and I'm givin' it ta you," Cait said, turning the bird on Curie. "Find someone else to accompany ya, if this is the crazy shite yer goin' for."

Cait didn't know if anything Curie was talking about was possible. But humans fell apart more easily than robots, and if Curie succeeded...Cait didn't want to stick around and watch her only friend learn exactly what it meant to be human.

Curie whirred her limbs a little in distress, and it seemed like she was going to argue. Cait cut her off.

"Unless," Cait said, "this'd make us even."

Back to the debt eating away at the back of her mind. Curie's lenses seemed to narrow at her.

"We _are_ even," Curie said.

"You get one debt from me, Curie. But if this is a favour, I'm sayin' no."

"Fine," Curie said, turning huffily away, for a robot, "I vill leave with ze next caravan. I just thought it vould be more enjoyable, traveling with you."

Cait snorted.

"I think yer memory circuits are malfunctioning now, love," she shouted after Curie as she left, using a mechanical arm to shut the ruined picket fence gate behind her. "Ain't nobody ever brought me along for the _company_."

Curie didn't answer, and Cait finished her beer.

She was out of alcohol. And this time, she knew she wasn't going down to Concord to get more. It wasn't alcohol she wanted.

As the sun set, Cait threw her last beer bottle into the weeds and clambered inside of the room she'd thrown together for herself. It wasn't much. She wasn't counting on staying here long, after all. She'd thrown an old mattress on the ground and fished an oil barrel out of the river to light a fire in, when the nights were cold. That was it.

Cait dug another vail of Psycho out of her bag. It was the sixth one she'd had today; her dosage had been climbing. She tried not to let it worry her, there was no point in worrying, but anytime she tried to lower the dosage or even just keep it even, she ended up spittin' blood or seein' things or just plain going crazy. She'd gone hunting for radstag a few days ago and had gotten into a fight with an elm tree. Still had the fucked-up hands to remind her of it.

So, she just kept upping the dosage, to whatever it needed to be. Who cared? She was a junkie.

Never all at once, though. She'd want to fight something if she did that, and there wasn't anything in Sanctuary worth fighting. She gave herself small bursts throughout the day. Sitting on the edge of her mattress, she slid the needle into the familiar vein on her arm, moved the handle just a bit. Just enough to feel it. Cait sighed, felt herself steady as the colours fixed themselves, and shapes stopped shaking in her vision.

She wanted to plunge the handle all the way down. She wanted Psycho for blood, pumping solid through her veins; she wanted to breathe fire, to tear down everything in front of her.

She took the needle out of her arm, set it down beside the mattress. She'd probably need a few more doses throughout the night.

One of Cait's favourite parts of being high on Psycho? Psycho dreams. Sober, she always had nightmares. On Psycho, dreams were all colours, shapes, shifting. Sometimes they took form. Shifting red became patches of spilled blood, flashing rectangles became razor blades, the deep black circle became the barrel of a gun. But those images never carried the emotion with them that they would have carried sober. Fear, horror, revulsion, regret. They were just images, with the wrong colours.

Tonight her Psycho dreams flashed around various metallic greys. The colours from Curie's metal construction, without any of the complicated feelings that usually accompanied them. Red and yellow hues from the sunset mixed their way in. Dead brown from the grass of the backyard, and the brown glass of her beer bottles.

But they only stayed Psycho dreams for a little while.

Those colours started to take shape, and not meaningless images, this time. These images brought all of their connections with them. Cait knew that as soon as the sunset orange and reds became the angry flush of her father's face.

"Payment up front."

Those words filtered in, and in the dream, Cait tried to run. Her neck hurt. She tried to run, and a spasming pain shot through her. The shock collar. The shock collar strapped securely around her neck, and she tried to pry her fingers under it, but she couldn't get a grip, wasn't strong enough to twist metal. She wasn't strong enough.

She fell to her knees.

"Payment up front," her father said.

The shock came again, and her throat was burning, her neck bleeding from trying to pry the collar off. She wasn't strong enough.

"Help," Cait tried to say.

She couldn't. She was choking.

Another convulsion of pain around her neck, and she wasn't dreaming anymore. Her father, the shock collar, the slavers, were gone, and she was on her shitty mattress on the floor in Sanctuary.

And she was still choking.

"Help," she tried to say.

She couldn't.

Her neck was bleeding, and she'd scratched nearly down to the muscle with her fingers in her sleep, despite the fact that her nails were worn down to nubs from fighting. She convulsed again, choking, her legs kicking uselessly. Something was choking her.

She didn't try calling for help again. This wasn't a dream. She knew no one would help her here.

Cait forced herself to turn over onto her stomach, despite the fact that she could barely see, lights dancing in her vision from not breathing. She leaned over the side of her mattress and tried to cough. There was something stuck in her throat. Blood? More solid than that. She wasn't drowning, she was choking. She tried to cough again.

It wasn't working. Nothing was fucking working. She was going to die on this shitty mattress, choking on her own blood, like the worthless junkie bitch everyone had always known she was.

No she wasn't. Not fucking today.

Cait reached into her own mouth with her hand. It was hard to do, her body rejected it, but her body rejected a lot of the shit she put it through. Stabbing a guy with her own broken arm bone, standing with her skull caved in. She could do this. She reached her hand back and tried to grab whatever was killing her.

Her hand was too big to fit down her throat, but she did manage to make herself throw up. After a few moments of heaving, she gasped in fresh air, coughing and spluttering.

Something was seriously wrong. Now that she could breathe, she realized her vision was hazey, she could barely see, and her abdomen hurt. Not I-got-punched-in-a-fight hurt, either. More like she'd been gutted with a chainsaw. Through her hazy vision, she saw that what she'd been choking on was - well, she couldn't identify it. But it was safe to assume it was a part of her stomach.

She crawled over to her bag, pulling out needle after needle of Psycho until she found the needle she was looking for - the stimpack Curie had given her. She injected it into her stomach, falling onto her back and drawing in ragged breaths while she waited for it to take effect.

It was the Psycho. She knew she'd been getting worse, but she'd been managing it, upping the dose and not worrying about the consequences. Well, here they were. Consequences. Fuck.

She felt the marks she'd left on her neck closing up. Powerful stimpack Curie had given her, if it was reaching that far. The pain ebbed, and so did the rush. Cait felt empty, shaken, laying on the floor next to a rusted oil drum.

"Help," she said.

Curie might help, if she asked. Medical-care-is-a-duty-of-mine Curie. Curie who wanted a favour from her. But how much would she owe Curie, if she asked for help? And could she trust her with this? It was one thing to let Curie stimpack her after a fight. This was deeper, more fucked, and Cait didn't know if she trusted anyone like that.

But even if she didn't trust her enough, what was the worst that could happen? Even if the debt was heavy, could the price be any worse than this? Because Cait knew she was going to get worse. And she didn't want to die that way.

Cait got to her feet, grabbed her bag. She'd never unpacked it. She never unpacked, no matter where she was. She would give Curie her Psycho. Tell her what was happening. Tell her how fucked everything was, and let Curie name her price.

She stumbled out into the night, the moon and stars vivid here, at the edge of the Commonwealth. Curie's house was a few down, she'd set up a small laboratory there, and a small first aid area. Moved in one hell of a lot more than Cait had, for a robot that didn't need a mattress to sleep on or an oil drum to keep warm by. Cait took the back way, through the yards, not wanting the other settlers to see her. She could just see the look on Marcy Long's face now.

She stopped in Curie's back yard.

She could still hear those words, echoing around in her head. Her father's words. _Payment up front_. The last words she'd ever heard him say, and they hadn't even been for her. They'd been for the bastards he'd sold her to.

Payment up front. But that's what she'd been getting, wasn't it?

She clutched her bag, her bag full of Psycho. Everything came with a price. Psycho took away her fear, made her strong like she needed to be, turned her nightmares into Psycho colour dreams. This? Choking, coughing, dying? That was just the price.

It wasn't a price she liked. But the alternative - if she walked in there, and asked Curie for help, she knew what was going to happen. Curie would take the Psycho from her. That was a consequence she couldn't live with.

Fuck it.

Cait sat down in Curie's back yard and plunged three Psycho needles into her arm, one after another. Pressed the handle down, closed her eyes, sucked in a breath through her teeth. Did it again. And again.

The relief was instantaneous. The high was instantaneous. For one moment, she just sat there, seeing the world through colours and shapes abstracted from the emotional connections that made them dangerous. The faded yellow of Curie's Sanctuary house, the dark blue of the sky, the dead brown of the grass. There was an old metal chain in the backyard here, next to a doghouse. No fear of chains came with it. It was just an image, with the wrong colours.

Cait picked it up. Twisted the metal apart with her bare hands.

She was strong enough now.

Cait took a deep breath, slung her bag over her shoulder, and walked into Curie's house. Curie was working at a chemistry laboratory in the remains of the kitchen, and she spun around to look at Cait as she entered.

"Cait!" Curie acknowledged. "Is everything alright? You are up quite late."

Curie sounded pleased to see her, even though they'd parted fighting last Cait remembered. _I am not your Stratton_. Whatever that had meant.

"If we leave for Goodneighbor now," Cait said, "we can make it before dark."

"I - " Curie set down the beaker she was holding in her mechanical arm. "But - you vere so adamant, before. You gave me zat rude gesture."

"I think you're crazy," Cait said, bluntly. "But I'm crazy too. So let's do this."

Goodneighbor had more things to kill than Sanctuary, if you were riding a Psycho high. And it had more things to kill you, if you were running away from consequences. It was better than choking to death on a mattress at the edge of the Commonwealth. Goodneighbor was Cait's kind of town, after all.

They left before the sun came up.


	7. Chapter 7

If Cait had wanted to drink alone, she could have just stayed in Sanctuary.

Not that Curie could have gotten a drink with her even if she'd wanted. Cait knew she should be grateful for some time to herself, some time to do non-Curie approved things like drink and pick some fights. But after a day's travel full of banter...Cait hadn't realized she'd missed it. Rolling her eyes at the things Curie said, Curie's oddly expressive gesticulations. She'd missed it in Sanctuary and she missed it now.

But Curie had wanted to spend the night preparing for the operation. They were really going through with it. Dr. Amari had a more realistic-sounding solution for them: downloading Curie's consciousness into a synth brain, rather than a human brain. Apparently Amari just had, like, brain-dead synths lying around somewhere. Empty hardware Curie could download herself into. To be honest, it gave Curie some serious goosebumps to think about. Amari didn't have these zombie synths anywhere convenient, though, so she'd sent out a courier, said they should be ready to go the next day.

So Cait had the night to herself. She just wished she didn't feel like she was wasting the last night she really had with Curie. If this surgery, this download, _thing_ , didn't go properly...but Curie had told her what she wanted. So drinks it was.

She'd been to The Third Rail a few times before. Goodneighbor was her kind of town. It never changed much, no matter how much time passed between her visits. Pros of having a robot bartender, she guessed. Magnolia was still singing mood music off to the side, the floor was still rotten as shit, and the drinks were still mediocre. Same old Goodneighbor.

"Oi," the bartender said to a drifter at the bar as Cait approached. "We got beer. And if you ain't buyin' beer, you ain't buyin'."

The drifter grumbled, shoveled out some caps, and took a watery-looking Gwinnett stout back to his table. Cait took a seat at the bar.

"Oi, Whitechapel," Cait said, imitating Whitechapel's 'Oi,' from before. "How's it hangin'?"

"Cait." Whitechapel Charlie, the Mister Handy robot bartender she'd never really paid much attention to, hovered over to her. His booster wasn't as whisper-quiet as Curie's. Then again, The Third Rail wasn't exactly the modern home. "I thought you were fighting at the Combat Zone. Whatcha doing here, love?"

Great. Just how Cait wanted to start her evening. Opening old wounds. She swallowed the 'fuck off ya rusted garbage can' that rested on the tip of her tongue. Charlie could and would give her the shitty beer if she mouthed off at him. Cait sighed.

"Well, to make a long story short, Tommy cut me loose. I think he was tired of me beatin' everyone all the time."

Whitechapel Charlie seemed to gauge her, his lense widening and narrowing. Analyzing. Cait probably wouldn't have noticed before, but she'd spent so much time now trying to read expressions off of Curie that it was second nature. He reached under the bar and slid her a beer.

"I wouldn't take it too hard," Charlie said. "I know Tommy, and I'm betting he's got your best interests at heart."

Cait's hand closed around the beer, resisting the urge to smash it against his face. Or, hardware, whatever the hell he had. Tommy was a son of a bitch, and it was a son-of-a-bitch thing he'd done.

But, well. She wanted the beer.

"Well, I'll tell you, if he does, he's got a funny way of showin' it," Cait growled, and let it rest there.

She knocked it back, hard, and coughed a little at the surprisingly fierce burn. That...wasn't beer. She looked back up at Whitechapel Charlie, cocking her eyebrows. Charlie leaned closer.

"Now, you can't really think we _only_ sell beers here."

"Well, on accounta the fact that's what ya always told me, that's what I was led to believe. Arsehole."

"I like to keep some cards up my sleeve, guv. To play for when I need them."

"Well, why're ya playin' em now, then?"

Whitechapel Charlie paused, as if to gauge her, to consider the weight of sharing a heavy secret - but he'd already given her the liquor, let her in on the secret, played his card, so Cait knew the pause was only for dramatic effect. Damn expressive robots.

"Got a proposition for ya..." Charlie said. "I need a dirty girl to do some dirty, dirty work. Blood on the pavement. Bodies in the ground. That kind of thing. Interested?"

Cait didn't care what the job was or how much it paid; she was interested. That was the whole reason she'd come to Goodneighbor, wasn't it? To get high on Psycho and smash something's face in. But there was no use letting Charlie in on that. Keep your cards up your sleeve, right?

She leaned back, noncommittal, and took a more prepared sip from the beer bottle. Bourbon.

"Sounds up my alley..." she hedged. She'd wait to hear the price though.

"I got a certain anonymous client who's payin' top dollar for a cleanup job. Three locations. Everyone inside. No witnesses. Only catch? It's all in town, in the old warehouses, so I can't use my regulars. Too noticeable. That's where you come in. The job's two hundred caps - "

Cait cut him off.

"Too low," she said, pulling the bottle away and belching. "Barely covers the risks."

Charlie narrowed his lenses at her.

"All right, 'guv," he said. "Three hundred."

"Three locations," Cait pressed, holding up her three fingers and counting them out on each syllable for emphasis. "That's a lot of time... a lot of bullets..."

"I'm _not_ goin' over three hundred, Cait."

"I'm not askin' ya to. Just," Cait said, sliding her empty bottle back across the bar, "keep serving me these, instead of that week Gwinnet shit ya usually got. For the same price."

Charlie took the empty bottle, considered a moment, then set it under the bar, and replaced it with a new one. Cait reached for it, and Charlie held onto it for a moment, staring her down.

"Two-fifty, and the special discount for the under-the-bar drinks. I've gotta run a business, Cait."

"Deal," she said, taking the bottle and knocking it back. She would have done it for just the price of the one drink, anyway. "I'll get it done."

"You better," Charlie said. "Now get out there and bust some heads."

"What, _now_?" Cait objected. "You just served me a drink."

"Well I can give the job to someone else, if you'd rather dilly-dally."

"Yeah, yeah, I'm movin'," Cait grumbled, knocking the drink back in one go. Damn. It was strong bourbon, too. She pulled her shotgun off of her back and handed it across the bar. Pausing, for dramatic effect. "Watch my shotgun for me, will ya?"

"You'll be _needin_ your shotgun if you're doin' what we discussed," Charlie growled at her.

"Now don't you be tellin' me what I will or won't be needin', Charlie. I've got a baseball bat, don't I?"

She left her gun on the bar and made for the staircase. Whitechapel Charlie shouted after her.

"You don't get paid if you die, guv!"

"I woulda done it for the shitty beer!" she shouted back.

She knew the warehouses. She'd done a job or two in these warehouses from time to time, knew guys who'd met her in the ring who were even more familiar. They weren't hard to find, but she knew they were locked.

The door to the first one she came to was out of sight from the main road. A lot of shady shit went on here, so they didn't like people seeing who came in and out. All the better for her, if she were going to go in there and murder everybody. She shook the liquor haze from her eyes just enough to kneel down in front of the door and twist a bobby pin into the sliver of the keyhole.

Nimble fingers weren't really something she'd needed in the Combat Zone, but she'd never let this skill die. It had been vital to her survival, in the worse times of her life. And she always knew it could get that bad all over again. Worse, even. All it took was trusting the wrong person. Getting betrayed, sold out. Pissing off the wrong person, even. _Payment up front_. So she'd practiced, on dummy locks if she had to, over and over again. She couldn't get rusty.

The lock creaked open easily enough. She'd met some resistance, but that was mostly from the literal rust on the keyhole. She pushed the door open, slow, keeping low and sneaking in. Shut and locked the door behind her. Let her eyes adjust.

"Hey, you find it yet? What's the holdup?"

Bickering, from up the stairs. There was a guy having a smoke break near her, but he hadn't noticed her come in.

"There are a lot of boxes, okay? Just hold onto your ass."

This was it. Cait dug a needle of Psycho out of her bag - she'd been craving this all day. Even with three full needles early this morning, the only thing that had kept her from re-dosing was Curie's watchful eyes. And, to be fair, her banter and companionship had been distracting. Cait had never traveled with a friend before. Never brought someone along for the company.

There were no friends here. She plunged the needle down, taking a full hit. Gone were the days of measured doses.

"It's like all I'm good for is waitin' around," the bickering guy from the stairs said. "Jesus."

Cait stood to her full height, pulled her bat back, and smashed it into the head of the guy in front of her as hard as she could, right against the brick wall next to him. He didn't even have time to flinch. His skull crunched sickeningly, delightfully, around the bat, and the end of it hit against the brick with a hollow-sounding wooden echo.

"What the hell was that?"

Cait pulled into the alcove, right by where the stairs let out. She could hear them coming down the stairs, their footfalls cautious now. As soon as they were close enough, she turned the corner, swinging the bat from up to down this time, crushing downwards on his skull. Another direct hit, denting through his head so hard it almost seemed to split in two.

The other guy was right next to him, and was starting to point his gun at her, starting to fire it. She kicked upwards with her right leg, before the previous body hit the ground, before she'd even removed her bat from his head. Her foot connected with the barrel of the submachine gun in her next opponent's hands, sending bullets shooting upwards into the wooden ceiling above them. The rest of the building was alerted to her presence now, she could hear people moving upstairs, shouting.

Cait let go of the bat, grabbing the man who's gun she'd just kicked by the top of his head and the bottom of his jaw and smashing his skull into the bricks. It cracked open like an egg. Cait watched the brains stick to the rough brickwork as she released what remained of his head, watched it begin to slide down the wall, in slow motion.

A brain. A normal, organic brain, as Doctor Amari would have said.

 _Her personality, though? All the extra pieces of robotic, programmed decision making? A normal, organic brain wouldn't know what to do with them._

There was plenty Cait's normal, organic brain didn't know what to do with. Extra pieces of emotional significance and shitty, useless feelings. Malfunctions, all of them. She needed abstraction. She needed the colours to be clearer, the shapes to be wrong. One needle wasn't enough.

Amari hadn't agreed right away.

Cait dug another needle out of her bag.

There was plenty eating at Cait, but the conversation they'd had with Doctor Amari before they'd left, that had left a new hurt in her she didn't know was coming.

 _I won't even consider something like this, unless there's a good reason,_ Amari had said.

Caps, Cait had thought. She could offer caps, bribe her, threaten her. That's how it was done, right? Wasn't that the reason she was looking for? But Curie had met Amari's challenge head-on.

 _I was programmed to further our studies of disease, pathogens, and viruses. I cannot do zis with ze fundamental limitations of my robotic systems. If I become human, with the wealth of information in my databanks I hope to do much good for the Commonwealth._

An attempt at persuasion, Cait had thought. And a shitty one at that. Who was going to fall for it? Who was going to believe that Curie wanted to help the whole Commonwealth? That she could, even if she tried? To care, even if she could? Cait had prepared herself to do damage control.

But Amari had put her hand to her chin, considered, nodded sagely. Bought it.

 _A Pre-War robot with your knowledge and skills plus human cognition. Yes, you could potentially save many lives._

And...Cait guessed, she hadn't realized, up until that moment. All of Curie's science shite, it had just seemed like a hobby, on the road or in Sanctuary. It was easy to forget that she'd been Vault-Tec. On the forefront of an elaborate research facility. That she had developed a fucking cure-all, once upon a time. And Cait hadn't realized, up until that moment, that Curie was important, and Cait wasn't.

Cait finished injecting another needle of Psycho, and the rest of the memory played itself out without the hurt connected to it. Nothing could hurt her. She had her Psycho, she had her high, she had a baseball bat and it didn't matter who was important and who wasn't.

Another guy flew down the stairs at her - her brain was working better now, less alcohol-slushy, more Psycho-wired, and she realized these were all Triggermen. She grabbed the handle of her bat from the ground, brought it down on his gun to rip it out of his hands, then up under his chin, knocking his head back hard enough to break his neck.

The next Triggerman came down right behind him, and she shoved the body onto him, knocking him to the ground, then smashing the bat down onto both bodies a few times, until the pile stopped squirming.

A blade sliced through the air, connected with her, dug into her shoulder deep enough to cut into the bone. She was knocked backwards, onto the ground, staring up into the eyes of yet another Triggerman. This one was too cocky. He had her on the ground, so he thought he'd beaten her, that it was over. He spit into her face.

"You're _nothin_ '," he growled. "Low-rent trash!"

"Don't ye think," Cait grunted, gripping the sharp of the blade with her bare hand and pushing it back, out of her arm, into his space, even as it drew blood from her hand and the blood dripped back into her face, "I fuckin' _know_ that already?"

She let go of the blade, her hand sliced down to the finger bones, and kicked out with her foot, just enough to give herself space. Scrambling back to her feet, she swung her baseball bat into his ribs. He crumpled, leaned forward, clutching himself, and she brought it down on his back, taking him to the ground. She bashed downwards, again, and again, and again. Blood was her armor, coating her in a layer the Psycho told her was thick enough to stop bullets. From the wound in her arm, from the cut in her hand, from the spraying brain matter of the ghoul on the floor beneath her.

It was a while before she realized the choked sound bubbling its way up from her throat was laughter.

Cait dragged her bat along the floor as she took to the stairs. Everyone inside, Whitechapel Charlie had said. No witnesses. The bat hit every step on her way up, slowly, methodically, playfully. _Thunk, thunk, thunk._

"Come out, come out, wherever ya are!"

Curie was big and important and significant. And Cait? Well, this was what Cait was.

The next one was higher than her, coming down the stairs at her, so when she swung she broke his legs first. Then his chest, crushed his heart through his ribs. A bullet dug its way into her other shoulder, another one clipped her ear. She threw her bat at the next one, end over end, like throwing a knife. It hit him hard in the face, breaking his nose and knocking him backwards. She stomped on his neck, breaking it.

Something silver caught the light as it fell out of his pocket. Right. She should be looting bodies. Charlie wasn't paying premium, after all. Cait bent over to pick it up, turning it over in her hand.

It was a silver pocket watch. They were common enough, but still fairly valuable. Usually around twenty or thirty caps, a couple of drinks worth. This one was damaged, though. Might lessen the value. Something had been carved into it. She rubbed the dust off with her thumb.

 _Carrick_.

She dropped the pocket watch, backing away. Fear touched her, even through her armor of blood and Psycho and liquor. Was this some kind of hallucination?

But she could still see the name staring up at her from the ground, the blood from her thumb falling into the cracks of the carved name on its silver face. It was his. She recognized it now. But how had it gotten here? Into the heart of the Commonwealth?

In any case, Carrick wasn't the man carrying it. The man with the broken nose and crushed neck whose pocket it had fallen out of, he was a stranger to Cait. Maybe Carrick was dead. With any luck, this dead asshole had killed him, taken his pocket watch. That's what it must mean.

Cait kicked the pocketwatch across the room and shoved another needle into her arm. Three more, this time. She wanted to erase that pocket watch from her memory, she wanted to never think about it again. She shoved the memory out forcibly.

Everything after that, was kind of a haze. She injected needles of Psycho whenever she felt like it. She swiped liquor off of the bodies at her feet, knocked back shitty moonshine and fine wines alike. Blood and sweat mixed on her skin and she just. Kept. Smashing.

And when she left the warehouse, she realized it wasn't the warehouse she had entered. The door was a different colour. She'd entered a white door, this one was green. Even though she felt like plunging down another needle, she held off. She checked the warehouse next door, the one with a blue door. That door had been kicked in off of its hinges, and it was littered in bodies. She didn't remember these bodies. But she was sure she'd put them there. They were smashed in bluntly, her kind of destruction, her kind of carnage.

She'd experienced time skips with Psycho before. Just never this bad. Then again, she'd never been using this much Psycho, either.

She cleaned herself up in one of the warehouses. Injected some stimpacks she looted off of some bodies, wiped the blood off with some dead guy's t-shirt. There was still a bullet in her shoulder, and she dug it out with bare, calloused fingers that didn't seem as nimble anymore as when the night had started. The stimpacks did the rest of the work.

As she left, the sun was beginning to peak over from behind the scrapped-together barricade walls of Goodneighbor. She'd had two hours of sleep in the past two days, but her body didn't even have the decency to feel tired. The drugs had her amped up, tense, anxious, paranoid. At the same time, her eyes felt like they were sinking into her skull, like they wanted to close but they didn't know how.

She'd had worse mornings.

She stopped in The Third Rail, collected her shotgun, her pay, and a drink. She needed something strong to make her cross the street to the Memory Den. There was a dread that lingered around it, one she couldn't really place. There were a million ways, of course, that this was a horrible idea. But Cait shouldn't care. Curie had made her decision. If the consequences were fucked, they were Curie's consequences. Not Cait's problem.

That's what she kept telling herself, anyway.

Curie was waiting down in the lab, alone. She seemed perfectly fine by herself, though. She was excitedly hovering around from terminal to terminal, examining Doctor Amari's equipment. There was a sleeping figure in a glass pod to the left. The synth body, Cait guessed. It had well-combed short black hair, and stern-looking features. Some decent biceps. She couldn't really imagine this strange, unfamiliar synth as Curie. Her only friend.

"Mornin'," Cait said to her, leaning against the wall.

"Oh! Cait, it is you! I did not notice your arrival. Cait, you are just in time. Doctor Amari is upstairs explaining her idea to the handler!"

A loud crashing sound reached them from upstairs, some yelling.

"Sounds like it's goin' well," Cait grimaced.

"Oh, do you think so?" Curie said, and Cait for the life of her could not tell if she was being sarcastic or genuine.

Heavy footsteps crashed down the wooden stairs to them. Cait fought the urge to grab her baseball bat - she wasn't in combat anymore. And Curie wouldn't forgive her if she saw what she really was. Low-rent trash, taking care of sketchy jobs for sketchy bartenders and laughing as she broke bones.

It was Glory who rounded the corner.

"So you're the one that wants to put a robot brain in G5-19?" Glory snapped on entering the room, approaching Curie at a breakneck pace.

Cait stepped right in the way of her path, arms crossed. Glory narrowed her eyes, and they stared each other down for a moment before Glory hissed at her:

"She's one of my people. A friend. I promised to protect them."

"Glory," Doctor Amari offered, catching up and putting a hand on her shoulder, trying to diffuse the situation, "she wanted new memories. She knew her personality would be all but erased. These are just different memories. Perhaps better ones."

But Glory wasn't backing down. Cait remembered how hot-headed Glory had seemed, back at the Railroad headquarters, a kindred spirit. And right now, Glory had tunnel vision. The way she stood, spine erect, the way she situated herself between the synth on the memory bed and everyone else in the room. There was no way they would be able to get to use the body, if Glory was the one calling the shots.

"What would G5 have wanted?" Curie piped up.

Glory's head snapped to Curie, shaken for a moment from her tunnel vision.

"What?" she asked, almost softly.

"What would G5 have wanted?" Curie asked again.

Cait remembered Curie asking that for her, back at the Combat Zone. _I vould like to know what Miss_ Cait _thinks._ Cait thought that maybe both she and Glory were looking at Curie and, for the first time, realizing that she was used to other people deciding things for her, and didn't like to see it happen to others. Glory glanced, half-guiltily, at G5.

"G5 was scared," she said after a moment. "Like most synths, she was terrified the Institute would find her and send her back. I tried to convince her she could live free, as herself. But she didn't listen."

There wasn't an opinion anywhere in there. As the silence stretched on, Glory seemed to grow more anxious, started pacing.

"G5 was a friend, all right? So give me some time."

"G5's off life support right now," Doctor Amari said, gently. "Her body is deteriorating. It's best if you decide soon."

"Right. _Dammit_." Glory stopped, knelt beside the pod, placed a hand against the glass. "I've been hoping the Doc could think of something," she said after a moment. "She's breathing and all... It's her, you understand. But I just need to let her go. I think...I think she would've wanted her death to mean something."

"Is that a yes?" Doctor Amari asked.

Glory stood up.

"Fine," she said. "Do it. Do it now before I change my mind."

"Curie," Doctor Amari said, "let's begin. Terminate all non-essential operations."

"Affirmative."

Cait shuffled, nervous, closer to Curie.

"Alright," Doctor Amari nodded. "Connection complete."

She typed away at her terminal for a bit. Cait couldn't even tell if things were going well or not. Panic welled up inside of her. She wondered again - what if this didn't work?

Amari glanced at Cait, seemed to notice her hovering hands.

"I have access to your friend's memories," she said. "G5's already been prepped, so this shouldn't take...long."

The typing continued.

"Yes," Amari said, nodding. "There."

And Curie fell to the ground like cutting the strings off of a puppet.

"Fuck!" Cait said, darting to catch her but not getting there in time.

The metal chassis crashed against the tile floor. _Fuck_. That had to be bad for the internal hardware. Cait grabbed the robot on the ground below her, trying to support it. She'd never had reason to try and lift Curie before - she weighed a ton.

"What's going on?" Cait demanded.

Was Curie gone?

 _I never said goodbye._

Before Amari could answer, Cait heard Curie's distinctive voice, her high French accent, from the other side of the room. She spun around to face it.

"I...I...my chest!" a voice gasped from inside the closed glass pod. "What is happening?"

Cait set the robot in her arms gently down on the floor, standing and walking across the room. Was that...Curie?

"Just breathe," Doctor Amari told her. "It's an autonomic function. Just let your body do what it must."

At the press of a button, the glass top came off of the pod, and the synth inside of it sat up. Cait lent her hand, helped the synth clamber out of the chamber.

"I...I feel...I feel so strange," the synth said.

"Listen to me," Amari said, commanding her attention. Cait let go of the arm she held, took a step back. "Can you hear me? What is your name?"

"My designation is Contagions Vulnerability Robotics Infirmary Engineer. Or Curie."

 _I am a Contagions Vulnerability Robotic Infirmary Engineer, or CVRIE. The human scientists call me Curie. Or more properly, they called me zis when they were alive._ Cait hesitated a moment.

"Is that really you, Curie?" Cait asked, low, quiet, almost like she was hoping to go unheard.

Curie's lips broke out into a wide smile at the sound of Cait's voice, a full, human facial expression of delight. And...shite. She was incredibly cute. Now that she had a smile, it was unguarded, unflinching, pure white and untainted. Now that she had limbs to gesticulate more fully with, she damn well did, her arms moving all over the place as she spoke. Her hair, which had been immaculately combed on the sleeping body of G5, was now just a little bit ruffled, a little bit caught up in her perpetual motion, and Cait had a feeling it would stay that way.

Cait hadn't been able to picture this body as Curie, but now that Curie occupied it, she shone out from it, made it her own. Her gestures, her expressions, her personality. Cait felt like maybe Curie had always looked just like this, and she had just never known it.

"Yes," Curie told her, gravitating clumsily towards Cait. No longer built for the modern home. "You sound so different with these ears."

Doctor Amari observed Curie's first few unsteady steps towards Cait.

"Good," she said. "Very good. Now let's test some cognitive functions. What is one plus two?"

"Three," Curie said, matter-of-factly.

"If I threw a baseball at your head, what would you do?"

"Uhh, move?"

And now there were eyebrows that furrowed together cutely in the middle of her forehead when she was confused. Cait felt like she needed to take a seat.

"Think of a strong memory," Doctor Amari said. "The first that comes to mind. Tell me about it."

"Uhh..." Curie seemed to cast about for a memory for a moment. "Doctor Burrow was...very old. He was ze last living scientist in my section of vault eighty-one. He was on his bed, very weak. He said to me, "Curie, you must..." and then he died, before he finished the sentence."

A beat of silence hit. Doctor Amari froze in her questioning, looking sympathetically over at Curie.

"Oh," Curie said, after a moment. "My insides feel peculiar. What is zat?"

Cait took an uncertain step closer. There could be any number of things wrong with this new body. If there was something hurting inside, they needed to get the doctor to look at it.

"Are you okay, Curie?" she asked.

"I feel... functional. But this feeling. My chest is tight. Poor Doctor Burrow."

Oh. Not that kind of hurt.

"The operation appears successful," Amari said. "But I think it will take...a lot of adjustment."

"Of course," Curie said. "Thank you, Doctor. For zis opportunity."

Amari nodded at Cait.

"I'll give you two a moment," she said leaving.

A moment? A fuckin' moment? Why the hell would Amari give her a moment? Cait didn't know what the hell to do here?

Curie swayed a little, and Cait led her over to the couch, let her sit. She seemed pretty unsteady on her feet. Not used to walking yet.

"How, uh..." Cait tried.

 _Ain't no one ever brought me along for the_ company _._

She tried again.

"How ya...holdin' up?" she asked.

Curie seemed preoccupied. After a moment, she said:

"Remember. To breathe."

She was focused on just that much. Cait wondered if she should call the doctor back. Breathing was pretty important. Curie seemed to settle herself, get a handle on it. But she still looked spooked. Shefaced Cait.

"I keep thinking," she said, "if I forget to do this, no more Curie. And suddenly all this excitement we do, there is an element of something new? What if my arm is blown off? It is not so simple to repair this now."

 _I, ah. I may require mechanical assistance._

Being a robot, having a limb blown off, it had been abstracted from the pain and fear that came with it. Curie had been calm, when she'd lost her limb on the freedom trail. She hadn't been in pain. Just inconvenienced. Cait knew what it was like to live in a world where nothing could touch you, where you were made of metal, and then to come crashing back down to being human.

"Here's some advice," Cait said. "Keep your limbs attached from now on."

Curie laughed, genuinely, openly.

"I will do so," she said, then seemed to examine herself, surprised at her own reaction. "That was strange. I laughed."

Cait smiled too, then her smile faded a little.

"Are you alright, Curie?" she asked.

This wasn't like her. It wasn't like her to get so worried, so invested. Wasn't like her to give a fuck.

"I... I will be fine," Curie said. "It is coming to me. Quickly, I hope. Just bear with me. I am sure my research will blossom with this magnificent new hardware."

Right. The research. She was Curie, she was important. She had her research. She was going to change the world. And Cait...

Cait snickered.

"Now _you_ are laughing. What is so funny?"

Curie was smiling. Cait looked slyly over at her.

"That _is_ magnificent new hardware, if I do say so meself," Cait said, wagging her eyebrows.

It took a moment for her meaning to sink in, but her tone carried it. And after a moment, Curie gasped, slapped her on the shoulder, admonished her. But she was laughing again. It was a beautiful laugh. And Cait didn't care what she was, in relation to Curie, as long as she got to hear it.


	8. Chapter 8

Curie's discoveries were small at first. Things like standing without swaying, walking in a straight line. Cait demonstrated how to flex, and she echoed the motion, showing off her muscles in different positions. She took some time to figure out how to function, pacing, practicing, testing out her new arms and legs. Then Curie looked down at her hands, pausing a moment to curl her fingers into and out of a fist. A grin crossed her lips.

"Look, I can do zis!" Curie exclaimed, holding her middle finger aloft in the air. "'Ze most important part of being human, Miss Cait!"

It was a clumsy middle finger, and it didn't have quite the same abrasive energy Cait was used to seeing it carry, what with Curie smiling ear to ear while making it. But it was a start. Cait couldn't help smiling back, flipping her own bird at Curie in what was becoming a gesture of solidarity.

"Well at least we both have that," Cait said.

She shifted, half-nervous, lowering her hand. This was it. Curie had a body. Mission accomplished. But Cait knew she, personally, wasn't going back to Sanctuary. Where was Curie headed?

"Well...now what?" Cait asked after a moment.

"Now what?" Curie repeated.

Right. She was still getting used to breathing. And walking. This wasn't the time to ask about long-term plans. And since when had Cait been one to need a plan? She could figure her own shit out. Cait recovered quickly.

"I mean, this is a big deal. Your first time out on the town with a human body. Whadya wanna do? Your first actions, as a human bein'. Now, I _am_ willing t' pitch in for prostitutes, on accounta the special occasion, but no more than - "

"I want," Curie interrupted determinedly, "to buy a toothbrush."

"A - a what?"

Cait hadn't really expected Curie to take her up on the prostitutes, but she wanted to go toiletry shopping? She'd expected at least, like, clothes shopping. Curie seemed like a sundress kind of gal. But _this_ was really...

"Are ya serious?"

"Proper dental hygiene is a most serious matter, Cait," Curie said, crossing her arms.

"Christ. Well, alright. Daisy's Discounts will prolly' have something like that."

It was across town to get to Daisy's, but it was a small town. Just across the street and through the alley, then a left. Curie only tripped twice. Once on the sidewalk, and again on her way into the store.

"Hey, a new face - watch yourself!" Daisy said, jumping up and cutting off her own sales pitch as Curie tumbled.

Curie managed to roll back up before anyone could really react, getting back on her feet and steadying herself with her arms out to either side.

"My apologies," she said, with a sheepish laugh. "I am not used to inhabiting a body."

"Uh...right."

Cait felt a flash of panic. They killed synths on sight in Goodneighbor. She was going to try and cover for Curie, make up some bullshit, but Daisy just shrugged her shoulders and returned to her counter. She didn't seem to have made any assumptions beyond 'weird.' Which, for Goodneighbor, was pretty standard.

"Buyin' or sellin'?" Daisy asked.

"Do you 'ave a toothbrush? And some toothpaste?"

"Sure, I think I've got some. I've also got higher-quality plastic than toothbrush plastic, though, and if you're looking to get the antiseptic from toothpaste I'd recommend - "

"She wants the toothbrush and toothpaste," Cait said, leaning against the wall next to the counter and watching the door. Old habit. "She wants to brush her teeth."

"Hmm," Daisy hummed, "most of the one's I've got might be a little rough around the edges for actually usin'. Let's take a look."

Daisy dug out a box of assorted junk items and started laying toothbrushes out on the counter one by one, most of them with the bristles bent or the handles broken, but there were one or two in decent shape. Curie started fussing over which brand of toothpaste to buy, and Cait dug in her pocket for some caps to pay for this junk with.

Her hands found something heavy and round that was not supposed to be there. A pocket watch.

She stiffened against the wall, hoping no one noticed. She'd been fucked up last night. So fucked up she didn't remember killing an entire warehouse of people. But what the _hell_ would possess her, in any state, to pocket Carrick's pocket watch?

Back then, she'd always wanted to steal this thing. Kept her eye on it. There had been a time in her life when twenty or thirty caps was all the difference in the world. But she'd never gotten the chance, till now. She'd been afraid to look at it last night. And now, it had been traveling around with her in her pocket the whole morning, without her even knowing. Acid girdled in her stomach, encouraging her to throw up.

"I got somethin' to sell, too," Cait said, her voice sounding very far away from her own ears all of the sudden.

She handed the pocket watch across the table, without looking at it. Daisy picked it up, turned it over in her hands. Read the name carved into it. Narrowed her eyes.

"It's not often junk finds its way back into my store so quick," she said. "I won't ask how you got this."

"You sold that?" Cait asked.

"Sure did."

"Then...you bought it, too?"

"That's how the business works, sweetheart. I buy things, and then I sell 'em."

Cait hesitated a moment - did she really want to know? But she didn't want to not know, either. Not knowing things never worked out too great for her.

"Who sold this to you?" she asked. "What did they look like?"

"Now, that much _ain't_ a part of my business. I buy and sell _things_ , dear, not gossip."

"I'll trade the watch back free if you tell me. Come on, it's not like it's some big secret, is it? It's just - I recognize t' name, is all."

"Carrick," Daisy said, thumbing over the carved-on name.

Cait flinched to hear it out loud. After a moment, Daisy shrugged and pocketed the watch.

"Tall. Ugly. Sideburns, and a scar over his right cheek." She paused for a moment. "Gunner, by the looks of 'im."

Carrick _would_ join the Gunners. _First there's trash, then there's Gunners_. That must have been what had brought him to this side of the Commonwealth. They had Gunners where Cait came from, and he might have joined up there, but the pickings were better here, and Carrick was ambitious. Made sense.

But at least he wasn't here for her. Not that he would be. She'd bought her way out fair and square.

"That's three caps altogether for the dental supplies, sweetheart," Daisy said to Curie.

Curie seemed to have forgotten she was holding them, watching Cait. Right. She must be curious, at the very least. And those new blue eyes of hers were too astute, too perceptive. If Cait wasn't careful, Curie was going to catch onto the weight that name carried.

Cait shrugged it off, digging some caps out of her pocket. That shook Curie into the present.

"Oh, Cait, you do not 'ave to pay!"

"It's a special occasion, like I said," Cait said, handing the caps over. "Though that sure ain't no prostitute."

"I am sure I vill find zis purchase much more rewarding."

Cait sighed, eyeing up the little blue piece of plastic and bristle.

"I guess you could sharpen the end, turn it into a shank."

"I think zis little toothbrush is perfect, just ze way it is."

Cait rolled her eyes, and they left Daisy's Discounts. Suddenly, Curie stiffened in excitement, gripping Cait's arm.

"I did not recognize it, before!" she said, her eyes lighting up. "Zat is ze old state house, no?"

"Uh, I think that's what they call it?"

"Oh, we must go inside! Maybe they have ze tourist brochure?"

Cait doubted it.

"Tourist brochure? What, is it special or something?"

"It is ze oldest public building in Boston! Ze Boston Massacre took place just outside its doors!"

"Really?" Cait said. "How many people died?"

"Five American colonists."

Cait snorted.

"Around here, love, they don't call that a massacre. They call it a Wednesday mornin'."

"It was a key event that led to the Revolutionary War!"

"Well, it sounds like we won't be needin' the tourist brochure," she said, holding the door open for Curie.

Curie was getting better at this whole walking thing. She shuffled excitedly inside, spinning slowly around and gazing wide-eyed at the wooden spiral staircase in the middle of the room.

"Zis staircase is beautiful! I vonder if it is the original. Per'aps zere is someone we could ask?"

Cait glanced around. A couple of ghouls were walking around with automatic weapons. Goodneighbor Watch, probably. And she knew for a fact that everyone came to the old state house to do drugs in the attic. Junkies and gun-toters.

"I, uh, I think that's gonna be a no."

"You cannot be serious? No one cares for history here?"

Curie looked so disappointed. It still amazed Cait, how Curie always expected people to give a damn. Nate, Doctor Amari, even Cait herself. Curie always assumed that people were out there giving a damn, and always got disappointed when they weren't. If Cait hadn't been sure before, she knew now that Curie had transferred over to this new body in full. Her personality and all the extra pieces of robotic, programmed decision making. Curie was there.

"Well," Cait said. She had to give her _something_. "The Mayor, Hancock, might know something? I dunno. He wears this old historic suit or somethin', and he's got an American flag wrapped 'round his arse. He lives here."

"Then we must meet zis Monsieur Hancock!"

 _If he's conscious_ , Cait thought.

"Up the stairs," she gestured.

Hancock usually occupied the living area on the second floor of the old state house. There were a few couches, a place to cook, and a chemistry laboratory where anyone could cook up their own chems. Cait wondered if taking Curie to Hancock was a good idea after all - he might just disappoint her further.

Sure enough, Cait could see Hancock taking a hit off of a Jet inhaler as she ascended the stairs behind Curie.

"Oh no," Curie said in dismay, almost as though she thought Hancock had done it by accident. "Zat is a chem, Monseiur! It can alter your mindstate!"

Cait nudged her.

"Think that's the idea, love," she said.

Hancock finished his hit, leveling his eyes on Curie for a moment. His bodyguard, Fahrenheit, kept her eyes on Cait. They'd heard of each other. Hancock tossed the empty inhaler on the table and leaned back, spreading his arms across the couch.

"Two a day keeps reality at bay," he joked.

"I - " Curie stopped, taking Hancock in. Genuinely trying to warn him. "There are many accounts, of singers, poets, intellectuals, and others who dabbled with chems such as you. They did not end well."

"People respect me because I don't put myself above them, all right?" Hancock said to Curie, an edge in his voice. "I sling and shoot up just like the next guy. Now if you're done laying judgement down on me, is there something else I can do for you?"

"Judgement? I - "

"We were hopin' you might know a thing or two about the buildin'," Cait said, interrupting a conversation she was sure wouldn't go anywhere good. "My friend likes history. I heard you did to, by the way you dress."

Hancock grinned, mood fully turned, gesturing towards his own outfit with an open hand.

"The clothes of John Hancock," he said, "first American hoodlum and defender of the People. I smashed 'em out of a case from this very building."

Cait had caught his attention, now that she'd spoken, and his eyes flashed in recognition.

"Say," Hancock said, "aren't you the one who handled that rat problem for me?"

Cait shifted. _I got a certain anonymous client who's payin' top dollar for a cleanup job_. She hadn't given a fuck who she was working for, as long as she got paid, but she never had learned who the anonymous client was.

"I did some pest control for Whitechapel Charlie. He never did tell me who was footin' the bill."

"Right. Thanks for that," he said.

"Oh! Was there an infestation?" Curie asked.

Hancock waved to Fahrenheit.

"Show the lady around, would ya Fahrenheit? Give her the grand tour while I take a minute to thank Cait here for the pest control."

Fahrenheit pushed off the wall. She wasn't a friendly presence, by any measure, but Cait supposed Curie had learned to handle a resting bitch face, traveling with Cait all the time. She walked forward and held out a hand for Fahrenheit to shake.

"I am Curie," she said, giving a friendly smile. "And you?"

Fahrenheit hesitated, but shook her hand. Cait could hear them make introductions as Fahrenheit showed Curie out of the room. She wondered what kind of tour Fahrenheit would be able to offer. Hancock gestured to the couch across from him.

"Take a seat, why don't you? Help yourself to what's lying around."

Cait sat down on the couch and put her feet up on the table, setting her backpack down by her side. She didn't take anything, though. Not until she knew what it would cost her. Hancock smiled at her.

"That was good work last night, Cait. I heard about your time in the Combat Zone, too. Hundred plus matches undefeated. Makes me think you're reliable enough for more serious work."

Cait gripped the strap of her backpack a little tighter, ready to sling it over her back and walk out.

"If you're talkin' contracts, you can shove it right up yer arse."

Hancock nodded, holding up his hands in a casual gesture of surrender.

"Don't wanna get tied down, eh? I can respect that. Just the one job then. Same pay as the one last night. Sound good?"

"What's the job?"

"I got reconnaissance needs," Hancock said. "There's a lot of weird talk coming in about a place called the Pickman Gallery. It's Raider territory up there, but they've been quiet. Like, uncomfortable post-coitus quiet? Snoop it out, and give me the word."

"You just want me to take a look at the place?" Cait asked. "Why'dya need someone as 'reliable' as me for some shite like that?"

Hancock sighed, looking suddenly worn, no longer so confident.

"Look, last guy I sent? He's gone quiet too. I don't want to lose anyone else."

Cait nodded. Depending on who the guy was, that meant it was fairly dangerous - and Cait didn't think Hancock would have sent a total amateur. She dug a needle of Psycho out of her bag, taking the opportunity to shoot up without Curie's watchful eyes. She'd been waiting all morning for this. To sate the itch, crawling through her veins. Hancock grinned, leaned back, took another hit from a Jet inhaler.

"So you're sendin' me cause you don't care if you lose me," Cait said finally, plunging the handle down enough for a small dose.

"I'm sending you because I don't think I will," Hancock said. "Hundred plus matches undefeated, right?"

Cait rolled her eyes. Wasn't like she gave a fuck anyway.

"Scout out Pickman Gallery. On it," she said, tossing the half-empty needle back into her bag.

"Cool. Be thorough, okay? I'm not paying for a look-see. Find out what's really going on there."

The sound of Curie and Fahrenheit coming back up the stairs reached Cait, and she stood, almost guilty. It wasn't like she was hiding these jobs from Curie. But. The _thing_ she had been last night. Her bat, thumping against the stairs as she climbed them. All the blood. The screaming. It...wasn't something she wanted Curie knowing about.

"Sorry there's not much left," Fahrenheit said, walking into the room.

Cait stopped dead in her tracks. She had never, in her life, seen or heard of Fahrenheit _smiling_ . She hadn't known her face could move like that. But here she was, chatting things up with Curie with a downright friendly demeanor, while Curie beamed right back.

"As is to be expected, after five hundred years!" she exclaimed. "I am impressed at what is left, and how much you know about it!"

"Well, when you live in a building like this, you get to know a thing or two about it," Fahrenheit said, looking fairly sheeping and pushing her hair behind her ear.

Cait blinked, and Fahrenheit assumed her usual bodyguard stance, nodding her head to Hancock.

"You two finished?"

Cait looked over at Hancock, and saw that he was just as shocked, sitting there with his jaw slightly agape.

"Uh, yeah," he finally managed, putting his jaw back in place manually with his hand. He narrowed his eyes playfully. "You two have a good time?"

"Oh, it was most informative," Curie said. "Miss Fahrenheit really brings this building to life."

"Does she now?" Hancock said, wagging his eyebrows.

"I should check on the storehouse, immediately," Fahrenheit said, and turned and headed straight back down the stairs. Cait would have sworn it was by steel willpower alone that she kept the blush off of her face.

But Curie could do that to a person.

"Come on," Cait said, sidling up next to Curie, who was watching Fahrenheit disappear with some confusion. "Let me show ya _my_ favorite part of the old state house."

"Oh?" Curie said, focusing her attention back on Cait. "And what might that be? Ze showcase room? Ze dining hall?"

"The _bar_."

"There is a bar here? I 'ave never been to a bar. I 'ave read so much about places like zis!"

"Time to go experience it," Cait said. "You have yer toothbrush, and you have yer guided tour. Now, I'm gonna teach ya how to get properly bladdered."

The Third Rail was underneath of the old state house, and you had to go outside to access it. The door to the subway was under the balcony Hancock gave his little speeches from sometimes. They could hear the commotion of the bar as they descended the stairs deep into the old subway tunnel, and as they reached the bottom, they could hear it come to a sudden stop. Everyone who continued talking did so in a low murmur, and most stopped talking altogether. Magnolia took the stage.

 _Like an earthquake, starting to roll_

 _I felt my world shake, out of control_

Curie came to a standstill.

Zis music!" she exclaimed. "It is so different to zese new ears! So lively!"

"Mmh," Cait acknowledged. "No more faulty audio circuits."

 _Like a world war starting to brew_

 _Baby, it's just you._

Curie pushed lightly against Cait's shoulder, grinning.

"Oh please, Miss Cait. You and I both know zat I was...how is it zat they say? 'Full of shit,' yes? I was full of ze shit. Zere was nothing wrong with my audio circuits. But I could not feel ze difference, before, between the spoken word and _music_ ."

 _Like a cyclone, wild and extreme_

Curie straightened suddenly, getting that fire in her eyes again.

"I must dance, Cait."

 _I got my mind blown, stalking your dreams_

"Good luck," Cait laughed. "You _just_ mastered walking."

"Oh, but surely you can lead?"

"I don't dance, love."

 _Waking up without a clue_

"For science , Cait! Please?"

"I'm not that easy."

Curie's eyes narrowed.

"What if I buy you a drink?" she offered.

 _Cause baby, it's just you._

Cait gave in. After all, Curie could do that to a person.

"Alright. I guess that's exactly how easy I am. Deal."

She knew a few basic swing steps. She'd gotten drunk in bars enough for that. Though her drinking usually ended in barfights rather than bar-dancing. They took the floor, Cait placing one hand on Curie's hip and the other in her hand.

"Ready, love?" she asked.

She didn't wait for a response, twisting into the few steps she knew, the back-and-forth. Lighter on her feet than usual. Partly for the purposes of showing off.

 _You leave me breathless, weak in the knees_

 _I'm feeling reckless, pardon me please_

Curie caught on quickly, echoing her steps and catching the rhythm. She looked up from her feet to grin at Cait, though, and lost it again.

 _The fallout's blowing through_

 _But baby, it's just you._

Curie had already recovered her rhythm, and now she was throwing fun little quicksteps into her footwork, making it up as she went along. She was better at this than Cait, naturally so, though Cait had more practice. She had a feel for the beat, the movements. A willingness to throw herself into it, where Cait was used to reserving herself. Cait narrowed her eyes. She wouldn't be outdone.

 _Help me, help me, rescue my heart_

At the climatic chorus of the song, Cait swung Curie into an unexpected spin, spinning her away, then back close again, and then parsing away dramatically with an outstretched arm keeping them together.

 _Save me, save me, from falling apart_

The line after had the same beat, so Cait did the same thing again - she only had so many moves, after all. This time she spun Curie in the opposite direction, with her other arm. But she should have known better than to let Curie get too good a look at the move - she was a fast learner, and a Cait could see the moment Curie looked up from her feet, grinning, and the tables turned.

 _Take me, take me, baby I'm sure_

Curie spun Cait this time, taking the lead, away, back in close, and then the parse, the room spinning around Cait and she went with it. And maybe Cait didn't mind so much that Curie was a better dancer.

 _You've got the power, you've got the cure._

Cait let Curie do the same thing Cait had done before, and spin her the other way, let themselves end on the dramatic standstill facing each other, connected by one outstretched arm. Someone cheared them from the couches, and out of the corner of her eye Cait saw others standing up to join. They settled back into the basic steps, Cait trying to learn and incorporate Curie's invented quickstep this time.

 _Like a train wreck, jumping the track_

 _Or a card deck, missing a jack_

 _What's the queen of hearts to do?_

 _Cause baby, it's just you._

The chorus came back again, and this time, they were both ready for it. They spun confidently, neither of them tripping or too surprised. Curie added some footwork to her spin, and Cait narrowed her eyes, watching that same footwork on Curie's second spin so she could mimic it when her turn came.

 _Help me, help me, rescue my heart_

 _Save me, save me, from falling apart_

 _Take me, take me, baby I'm sure_

 _You've got the power, you've got the cure._

Cait kicked a barstool extending on the end of the chorus, but no one seemed to mind. She was grinning ear to ear at Curie as they both came back in for the closer swing steps.

 _Like a mushroom cloud in the sky_

 _I felt my world stop, waving goodbye_

 _Radiating through and through_

 _Baby, it's just you_

The end of the song was coming up. Cait didn't have any more moves to show off, any good finale for the song. But by the twinkle in Curie's eye, she figured she could leave the ending to Curie's discretion.

 _Radiating through and through_

 _Oh baby it's just_

 _Baby it's just_

 _Baby it's just you._

Curie spun Cait once more and ended by tilting her into a low dip - a little unsteady, and probably lower than she'd meant to, but low just the same. And Cait knew she wasn't light. She was made of muscle and a heavy drinker. Not an easy dip.

"Yer stronger than ya look," Cait said, clearing her throat and standing as the music ended. "Well. I think ya owe me a drink?"

Curie gripped her chest, amazed at her own breathlessness.

"Zat is quite vigorous exercise!" she said. "Yes, of course. Per'aps you can claim a table?"

Cait nodded, waving to Whitechapel and gesturing to Curie to let him know Curie was buying for her. She wanted the good stuff, not the shitty, stale beer.

"I would like a Rum and Nuka-Cola," Cait heard Curie say as she approached the bar. "With a bunch of cherries, please."

Cait snorted. She didn't have to stay and listen to know Whitechapel Charlie's response.

 _We got beer. And if you ain't buyin' beer, you ain't buyin'._

She grabbed a table in the corner, far enough away that no one would be able to listen in on their conversation, especially with all the music. That had been...strange, for Cait. She'd danced before, but never like that. Everything that Curie did, she seemed to throw herself into, without reservation, without fear of who was watching or what they might think. A little of that had worn off on Cait, for just a moment.

Curie arrived with two beers, pushing one over to Cait.

"Monsieur Whitechapel said zis one is for you," she told her.

So it was the not-beer then. Good.

"Cheers," Cait said, raising her bottle.

"For science!" Curie said, knocking her beer back.

Cait laughed, watching her grimace afterwards, wipe her mouth with her flannel sleeve. Curie furrowed her brow, as if mentally taking notes. Cait's grin faded.

"For science," Cait repeated. "Did you really go to all this trouble for that? For some experiment? You realize you coulda...you coulda just, stopped existing. If that transfer hadn't worked right."

It had been bothering Cait. This whole thing, from the beginning. There had to be more to it. Curie leaned back, thinking for a moment.

"Yes...and no," she said.

"Yes and no?"

"I love science. I love to use science, to do good for the world, and for myself. This grand adventure, zis becoming human, it has been for science, and it has been for me. To be honest, I have been discontented ever since I escaped from ze vault I was trapped in for so long."

"Do you want to go back?" Cait asked.

Vaults were safe, secure. Havens of science. Nothing like the hellish wasteland outside of them. And Curie, well, combat was not her primary function. But Curie shook her head.

"Never. I was a prisoner there, a prisoner of my own programming. I spent two hundred years, alone, wishing for a way out. And I convinced myself zat if I could just get to ze world aboveground, I could be free. But I still felt so very trapped. It was not the vault I vas prisoner to. It was my programming. Faulty audio circuits can only buy me so much freedom," Curie said, smiling ruefully. "I much prefer ze ability to do zis."

She stuck up her middle finger in front of her, at no one in particular. Cait snorted.

"I'm a bad influence on you, I think," Cait said. "You're gonna do that to the wrong person one of these days."

"I think I vill do zis to ze exact _right_ people," Curie said, and there was a deep anger, a frustration, there. "Ze world is so full of cruelty. And besides, you never seem to worry about who is ze wrong or right person to pick a fight with."

"Yeah, it's one of me worst qualities."

"On ze contrary, Miss Cait, it is one of ze many things I respect about you. You are so very _free_."

Cait thought about that for a moment. The drink was strong enough, it was reaching her. Maybe she could talk about it, if she had that hazy curtain of booze. She slogged back another three gulps of bourbon for good measure.

"I wasn't always free," she said quietly. "I was a slave. For five years."

Curie's voice lowered as well, sombered.

"Miss Cait...you do not 'ave to speak of it if..."

"No," Cait said, shaking her head, "I think maybe it's time to tell you a little bit about who you're travelin' with. There's no reason for us to keep actin' like we're strangers."

After all, Curie had opened up quite a bit to her. It was only fair. She finished the bottle, and when she started speaking, it felt like she was opening a floodgate she'd kept shut tight for so long.

"It all starts with two wastes of humanity I suppose you could call me parents. I'm convinced I was a mistake, because I can't remember a single moment that they treated me like their daughter. I was yelled at and beaten. Everythin' I did was wrong. Nothin' but a nuisance in their eyes. The whole time I was tellin' meself that they had to love me, even if it was just the tiniest bit, because they never kicked me out."

And god, part of her still wanted that. Still wanted that love that had never really existed. That's why this next part of the story was so important. She had to remind herself what happened when you lied to yourself about love. Why you needed your reservations, the ones Curie didn't seem to have. The 'and then' that every story had. The consequences.

"...then me eighteenth birthday arrived, and I found out why they kept me around. They slapped a shock collar around me neck and sold me to slavers. They didn't even care enough about me to say goodbye. Eighteen years of sufferin' through that shite and all I was worth to them was a pocketful of caps."

 _Payment up front_. That acid burned in Cait's stomach again.

Curie's voice was low, tender.

"Mon dieu. I am so sorry."

That wasn't the half of it. There was one more, brutal 'and then,' coming. Cait braced herself to tell it. What had happened after she'd gotten free. What she'd done to her parents. What she'd become.

Curie reached across the table, placed her hand on Cait's and gave it the softest, kindest touch Cait had ever known in her life. Comfort. Cait's eyes shot up from the table, away from her drink, finally meeting Curie's gaze, and it was so full of - something. Curie was leaned toward her, her hazel blue eyes shaded with emotion and, Christ. Cait couldn't finish her story. Not with Curie looking at her like that. Not with how her story ended. What she'd done. How would Curie look at her then?

Cait pulled her hand away. She couldn't keep lying to herself about love.

"It would be easy to blame me charmin' personality on me parents," she said, then even more harshly, "but they didn't make me this way. _I_ did."

It was as close as she could come to finishing the story. A warning. A half-truth.

"A child _needs_ love, Miss Cait." Curie said. "A child needs all the love you can give them. You...you did not get that."

"I didn't _need_ anythin'," Cait snapped, "then or now."

Curie drew back a bit, and Cait sighed.

"Sorry," she said, in a low voice. "Just...Carrick. Bloke what owned the pocketwatch I traded back to Daisy this morning. He was one of them slavers. He...he used to own me."

Curie stiffened.

"Is he after you?"

Cait shook her head, resolutely.

"Nah. That's why I was checking in with Daisy, but there's no chance that's why he's in the area. I bought my way out, fair and square."

"You _bought_ your way out? That...must have taken a while."

"I was with those slavers for five years," Cait acknowledged. "Roughest five of me goddamn life. The things they made me do... the way they used me for their amusement. It sickens me to my stomach even thinkin' about it. But I bidded me time and learned to use their own methods against them. Stealin' a few caps out of a sleepin' man's pocket is a piece of cake... as long as you don't get greedy. It took every ounce of patience I had, but after five years I had finally pocketed enough to buy me own way outta there."

"That's incredible, Cait. I mean it. I cannot even imagine having to go through that, and you got out all on your own, with no help. I wish you had not have had to."

"Well," Cait said, backtracking a bit. "I prolly prattled on too much. Just...yeah. I'm not as free, or as brave, as you maybe think I am. That's not me. I'm an ex-slave what snuck and stole 'er way out, and wound up with raiders payin' me to fight in the Combat Zone."

"That sounds awfully brave to me," Curie said. "And awfully free. And while we are talking, zere is something Monsieur Hancock said today, which has been bothering me. I - Cait, I never meant to make you feel, judged. Zat time you injected dangerous chems. You are no less brave or free or my friend for it. I vas only - concerned. But if it is not my place to be, you need only tell me so."

Oh, yeah. That _one_ time she'd injected dangerous chems. Cait's lip twitched, her eyes on the table.

"...thanks. I'm just glad I haven't disappointed you," she said. Agree to disagree.

Curie put her hand on Cait's again, that same comforting touch and that gaze full of _something_ that Cait just wholeheartedly wasn't ready for.

"I'm always here for you, Cait," Curie said. "There's nothing you could say that would ever change that. I promise you, you vill never 'ave to go through something like that alone again."

"Oh! I - um. Well," Cait stuttered, trying to find her train of thought.

She couldn't with Curie looking at her like that. She pulled away again, grabbing her bourbon, taking a swing.

"That's...that's not what I expected you to say." Cait cleared her throat, wishing she had Fahrenheit's iron will so she could banish the blush from her cheeks. "Sorry, I didn't realize you cared that much about me. And here I thought I was bein' stupid botherin' you with me problems. It feels good to know if I need you, you'll be there for me... and I'll always be there for you too."

Cait wasn't looking at Curie when she said it, but she still saw her smile. It was too much. Cait nodded over to Curie's bottle.

"That empty?" she asked. "Second round's on me."

Curie handed her the bottle, and Cait got to her feet and made her way to the bar. Whitechapel Charlie finished handing another customer a Gwinnet, and Cait waved him over.

"Somethin' _strong_ ," she told him.

"For you or for the lady?" Whitechapel asked.

"For me. Water down the other one. She's new to drinkin'."

"Right," Charlie said.

Cait turned a little to look back over at Curie, see how she was doing. She hadn't seemed too tipsy, although she did seem...bold. But maybe that was just her.

Cait realized the person next to her was staring straight back at her, and she tensed, ready to snap at the stranger for wandering eyes. Then she recognized the face.

"Glory?" she asked.

She had changed clothes, into a hooded outfit which covered her face unless you were looking her dead on. She had a shitty beer she'd hardly touched on the bar in front of her. Cait's eyes narrowed.

"You spyin' on us?"

"It's a public bar," Glory said. "And I definitely need a drink."

That much was fair. Cait knew she'd sacrificed a lot to give Curie the body she was so excited to have. As Whitechapel returned with their drinks, Cait handed hers to Glory.

"Here," she said. "On me."

"I've got a beer already," Glory said.

"I know. It's shite, innit? Another drink for me, Whitechapel. Thanks."

Whitechapel harrumphed a bit at Cait handing out the under-the-bar drink, but dug another one out for Cait and laid it on the bar. Glory took a sip of her new drink, raised her eyebrows. Gave Cait a nod of appreciation.

"Thanks," she said quietly.

"Sure."

It wasn't a free drink, they both knew that. An explanation was needed. The change of clothes, her presence in the bar. She was watching them. Why? Her and Doctor Amari, they couldn't...take the body back, could they? If they wanted?

Glory sighed.

"Listen G5-19 went through a lot, but she was good. Solid. I was hoping...hoping a little of that would still be there."

That's why she was here, making her way through Whitechapel's shitty beer. Watching.

"That's...that's not G5," Glory finally said, and her words had the kind of echo nails make being hammered into a coffin.

It was a good thing, when Cait was watching it. The way Curie's smile transformed the face, claimed it, made it hers. Her exuberance, her lightheartedness, everything about her that was just a little bit off-kilter. But for Glory...watching it must be so twisted. Another person inhabiting your friend's body. Cait wondered if she'd seen them dancing.

"What was G5 like?" she asked, after a moment.

"Tough," Glory said. "Tough enough the Institute had to strip her mind. More than once. When I saw G5... She didn't even recognize me. But I owed her from my time in the Institute. That's all I'm going to say."

She knocked the rest of her drink back. Maybe talking about G5 had been too much, because Glory looked completely shut down now. Her shoulders had lost their tension, and there were dark circles under her eyes that seemed suddenly more pronounced. She set her bottle down, pushed her stool away from the bar. Paused.

"This Curie seems alright," she said, not looking at Cait. Looking over at a table in the far corner, where Curie sat wearing G5's face. "Maybe... Maybe G5 would've liked her."

Maybe was the key word, because it was the most they could do. Assume. _What would G5 have wanted?_ G5 was gone. She wasn't around to say whether or not she liked Curie, whether or not giving up on her and letting her go had been the right thing. Both Glory and Cait realized that, let it linger for a moment. The maybe.

"Thanks for the drink."

Glory turned and made her way to the stairs across the room. There was something broken there, something that couldn't be fixed. It was the way things usually were. Cait had just gotten caught up, is all. Caught up in Curie and her fearlessness and her dancing and her laughter. But G5 and Glory and maybe, that was reality. Cait dug out her half-empty needle of Psycho, injected it into her arm while she was at the bar and Curie couldn't see.

And to be honest, she'd never felt less brave or free in her life.


	9. Chapter 9

It came as a surprise to no one that Curie was a total lightweight. It wasn't even midnight yet when Cait threw Curie's arm over her shoulder and guided her across the street to the Hotel Rexford. She giggled her way up the stairs, her cheeks flush and her hair ruffled, her flannel unbuttoned all the way down so that it flapped open, displaying her plain tank below it.

"Come," she was saying, "don't you have any hypotheses?"

"Hypo-what?" Cait asked.

Curie had been talking about science. Cait had been admitting her lack of interest. Curie leaned heavily into Cait.

"Science is not so complicated as you might think, Cait. It is not always numbers and computers. It is simply - a way of looking at the world. Like hypotheses!"

"Repeatin' it don't make me learn what it is."

"A hypothesis is kind of like a theory, that you test. Do you have any theories?"

"Not smart enough for that, love."

"Bull - shit," Curie said, pixie-like, in two separate syllables. "A hypothesis starts with a question. Surely you have questions? Curiosities?"

Cait tended to try not to ask questions. They usually had bad answers. But Curie was smiling, light, safe. Cait thought for a moment.

"A question..." she said. "D'ya - d'ya think that singer Magnolia, from the bar, has really done all those things in the songs? Swimmin' with the swans in the commons, stark ass naked? Shite like that?"

 _Took a dive with the swans_

 _Out in the commons with nothing on_

It probably wasn't the kind of scientific, universal question Curie had been hoping for. But when Cait looked at Curie, there was none of that dreaded disappointment on her face. She latched onto the concept.

"Yes!" Curie said. "What a fascinating question! And now, to make a hypothesis - you pick a theory, and you test it. Like in Sanctuary, when you started a betting pool for Nate - if you were to bet on an answer, which would it be?"

Cait narrowed her eyes, thinking. The stuff Magnolia had been singing about - it was too much, really. Extremely unrealistic. Who the hell would go skinny dipping in an irradiated sludgefest in the middle of the Commons, known haunt of a giant monster? Why? The mutants start to savour, all my bad behavior - it was fucking crazy. Out of this world.

"I bet she's really done it," Cait said.

Those things were wild, but Magnolia had this vibe to her. One that made even Cait careful about how loudly she spoke when Magnolia was on stage.

"And there! We have a hypothesis. And then you must test that hypothesis, to see if it is correct or not. How might you test zis one?"

"I dunno. Ask her? Ask other people? Follow her and see if she does some more crazy shite?"

"Yes, zese are very good methods."

"What about you, Curie? What are your hypotheses?"

It was probably a stupid question. Curie probably had a million hypothesis, a million experiments, and a million more questions. But Curie seemed to have one in mind.

"I have a hypothesis," she slurred, "that benign gestures or actions function, on some level, like a virus. It can be contagious."

Cait hesitated.

"And how...how d'ya plan on testin' that one?"

"Oh, zat is simple. I will be kind to everyone I meet, and observe ze spread of zis goodwill. I have high hopes for zis experiment, and it is one zat is so easy to test."

They reached the top of the stairs, and Cait oriented herself for a moment, trying to find their room. Clair at the front desk hadn't spent much time explaining to them where it was, since she could see they were both drunk as hell.

"Do you remember?" Curie suddenly slurred, as though it was the most important thing in the world.

Cait furrowed her brow.

"Remember what?"

"The mortality rate of Influenza C...was it eighty-eight percent? Or eighty-nine percent? I cannot remember! It is so frustrating."

Hmm. That could be the drink. Or...

"You're not a robot anymore, love. Humans can't always remember things spot on."

Curie gave a small noise of distressed agreement. Cait located their room, started directing them clumsily to it.

"Yes. I find myself forgetting small details I knew before. And it is so much more difficult to count things, to number them exactly. I find myself losing my place, having to begin all over again..."

She was looking at Cait as she spoke, but not her face. Her gaze was drifting, over Cait's shoulders and arms, and she trailed off.

"Do ya - " Cait cleared her throat, looking away. "Do ya regret it? Goin' human?"

Curie shook her head.

"Not a bit. There is so much more - sometimes, I feel things so _vividly_. It's a wonder people don't explode."

"Sometimes they do, love," Cait joked, pushing open the door to their room.

Inside the room was a double bed frame with two mattresses on it, a desk, a dresser, and a couch. Pretty damn fancy, by Cait's standards. But she wasn't sleeping in it. She laid Curie down on the bed, re-adjusting her bag on her back. She had a job to do. Reconnaissance.

An arm reached out and caught her wrist. Curie turned over and looked up at her from the bed.

"I do not regret it. But I wish it were easier. I want to number the stars in the sky, to measure the exact decibels of the music that enchants me so much. I do not want to forget one thing."

"You can't count everythin', Curie."

"Not everything," Curie agreed sadly, turning over again. Then, after a moment, she murmured into her pillow: "You 'ave twenty-four thousand, five-hundred and forty-seven freckles."

That tripped Cait up, for a moment. Curie grinned, watching her reaction through her half-closed eyelids.

"I may not be a robot anymore, but z'ere are some things worth counting."

"I - " Cait tried. She pulled away. "I gotta go."

Curie hummed, too tired and tipsy to mind.

"Goodnight," she said.

Cait backed out of the room, shutting the door behind her. She stood mutely in the hallway for a little while, collecting herself. Cait...had never thought of herself as being worth anything. Her fighting prowess came from the Psycho, and that was about all she had. And here Curie was, counting the freckles that lined her face and arms and shoulders like that was knowledge worth having. Like Cait wasn't going to be dead by the end of the week.

Because that's where this was headed, wasn't it? That's why she had come to Goodneighbor. Because she didn't want to die choking on a nightmare on a shitty mattress in Sanctuary. That's why she was taking these jobs, from Whitechapel Charlie, from Hancock, bringing only her baseball bat and leaving her shotgun at the bar. She wanted something to get her. Before it got any worse.

It was getting worse. The pain in her stomach wasn't from the liquor, and she knew it was the Psycho catching up with her again. If she slept, she was going to wake up choking. She hadn't slept since Sanctuary. The Psycho let her stay awake, stay wired, keep killing. Just until something else could kill her, so she didn't have to die like that.

Where did Curie fit into all that?

Curie, who thought she was worth something. Curie, who was naive, and wrong. She didn't know the full story. Cait hadn't told her what she really was, and she didn't want her to know. But Cait knew Curie was going to be sad when she died. And she didn't think there had ever been anyone in her life to mourn her before. It was fucked up, really. First good thing to come along in her entire, shitty life, her first friend. And Cait was dying.

Cait pushed off the wall, suddenly adrenaline-fueled. It felt like she'd given herself a small hit of Psycho. She rushed down the stairs, a little haphazardly - after all, she'd been drinking too, even if she had a stronger stomach. She knew there was a chem dealer in the basement, Fred Allen. She knew he liked to experiment with chems, too. Maybe he had something new. Something that could help her.

Fred was asleep, or passed out, or high, or something. Planked facedown on a mattress on the floor next to his chem lab. Could he breathe like that? Was he dead? Cait turned him over, shaking him as she did so.

"Oi, Fred," she said. "Wake up."

Fred got to his feet, supporting himself on the wall. His pupils were dilating and contracting at random intervals. Definitely high.

"Ah, man, someone new!" he said.

Cait wasn't new. They'd met several times before. But Cait didn't correct him.

"You need some Jet, man. Homebrewed. Reasonable prices."

"Need somethin' else," Cait said, and hesitated. "Addictol."

Fred nodded knowingly.

"I been there. Pick a favorite chem, and sometimes it gets under your skin. I got watcha need."

He dug around in a trunk, and brought out a red inhaler, shaking it to see if it was empty or full. He handed it over.

"This is a Jet inhaler," Cait said.

"Well, it used to be. Everything's homebrewed here, like I said. Reused the container, but it's still addictol. That'll clear you of about any addiction you have. Not cheap though. Hundred and thirty caps."

"How strong is it?" she asked.

"How strong is it? Well - should be about average quality. I followed the recipe, right?"

Cait turned the little inhaler over in her hands, biting her lip. Fred noticed her hesitation.

"Is it the price?" he asked. Cait shook her head. "Hey, just say anything that comes into your head. That's what I do."

Cait was sure it was. She sighed.

"Look," she said. "I've...I've tried usin' addictol to get clean before, and it hasn't worked. I'm just tryna find somethin'...strong, yeah?"

Fred furrowed his brows.

"Addictol didn't work? How long ya been usin'? And what?"

"Psycho. For...for eight years."

There was a beat of silence. Fred whistled.

"That's a hefty addiction. To be honest, I haven't heard of someone livin' that long with a serious addiction to a heavy chem like that."

"Well, I won't be livin' much longer without somethin' that's _above_ average quality," Cait said, handing the overpriced inhaler back to him. "Ya got anything better? C'mon, Fred, I know ya experiment."

"I experiment with the fun chems, pal, not the responsible ones like addictol. And I'm not a doctor, either, just your friendly neighborhood chem dealer. Listen," he said, handing the inhaler back. "This? It's the best I got. I say, give it a try, and if it doesn't work, your best bet is Doctor Sun in Diamond City. He's more into the... _responsible_ , chems."

"Fine," Cait said, digging her sack of caps out of her backpack and shoving it over to him.

Fred counted out the amount, the metal bottle caps scratching against the table of the chemistry lab as he did so. When he handed it back to her, there were only about fifty caps or so left in it. Talk about some overpriced bullshit. But who knows, maybe it would work. Maybe she just had to be desperate enough.

"Thanks, Fred," Cait said, begrudgingly.

Fred seemed to realize for the first time that she knew his name.

"Do I know you?" he asked.

Cait didn't answer and just left. Fred was high anyway, he probably wouldn't even register that she'd been rude.

No one even took note of her leaving Goodneighbor at this time of night. The only people who were still out were high or drunk. Although, that was Goodneighbor during the day, too.

It wasn't as short a journey to Pickman's Gallery as it had been to the warehouses. Cait should have charged extra for the time spent in travel. Although, she supposed, the warehouses had been a total cleanup job, and this was just scouting. With the added risk of 'quiet,' whatever that meant.

The route mostly followed the freedom trail Cait and Curie had cleared with Nate over a week ago, so she knew the area well enough. Knew where the enemies were, what to watch out for. She wondered if Glory was watching her make her way through North Boston. _Saw some of your work along the trail, Cait. Not bad. For a human, that is._

The freedom trail ended at the church, but Cait kept going. Past the church, there was a boxing gym, and she inched closer to the sealine to make her way around the building. She could hear raiders clustered right around the building she was aiming for. Pickman's Gallery. Not so quiet right now.

She'd brought both her shotgun and her baseball bat this time. This was it. She was about to go into another firefight. She leaned against the brick wall behind her and dug some chems out of her bag. The Psycho, and the Addictol.

Could she even fight without Psycho? Was she even worth anything without that iron running through her veins? And the addictol would probably just make her sick. It was no way to go into a fight.

 _You 'ave twenty-four thousand, five-hundred and forty-seven freckles._

Shite. Cait tossed the Psycho back into her bag, brought the addictol inhaler up to her mouth. Plunged the trigger all the way down.

It tasted a bit like Jet, but just an aftertaste. Fred probably hadn't cleaned the container properly before stuffing the addictol into an old reused Jet inhaler. Whatever. It wasn't Jet she had an addiction to, anyway.

She felt like shite, but to be honest, no more than usual. That didn't speak highly of the quality of the addictol. Cait shook her head, braced herself, and leaned around the corner, shotgun in hand.

Four raiders, and they looked angry. Cait took a potshot at one, and caught him by chance, even at such long range. She ducked around the corner as the rest of them noticed her, reloading the shot she had spent into her shotgun so she would have a full two shots when they were in range. The remaining three came around the corner for her, and she hit the first one center of mass, with her wide shotgun spread, blasting him backwards into the brick wall. She aimed for the next one. Missed.

Missed? Since when did she miss? The guy was close, within ten feet, and a shotgun had a wide spread. The lack of sleep must be getting to her, now that the Psycho wasn't there to keep her afloat.

The remaining two raiders were on top of her now, and she threw a punch at one of them. He stumbled back, rubbing his jaw, but she hadn't knocked him out or even broken his jaw. Bullshite. She dodged a punch from the other one and hefted him with her shoulder, throwing him over her and managing to break his neck on the sidewalk. Then the next one was over her, grabbing her neck, trying to strangle her. He smelled like sweat and shite.

Cait reached out for anything her hands could grab. A gun, her baseball bat. They landed on a knife on the raider's belt. A switchblade. Dumb fuck was using his hands when he had a switchblade on his belt. She shoved it up into his guts, and he died, slowly, over her. He coughed blood onto the concrete the same way Cait was used to doing. When he stopped, she shoved him off.

Well, the courtyard was cleared. Time for the rest of the building.

The door was bright red, unusually crisp. Like it was maintained, re-painted. Funny kind of red paint, too. Cait wasn't sure she'd seen this kind of red paint before. She pushed the door open, carefully. There were two raiders at the end of the dark hallway in front of her. They hadn't noticed her yet. She shut the door behind her.

"You think we're gonna catch this Pickman psycho?" one of the raiders said.

'Slippery bastard got away before,' the other grunted. "But Slab won't leave a man breathing after he's hunted our crew."

"I heard Pickman skinned Roy alive after he snatched him, let the rats get at him. Gives me the creeps just thinking about it."

"No joke. The faster we clip this asshole, the better. Always feels like something's watching me in here."

Cait shivered. Was this Pickman another raider? Raiders did stuff like that to each other. And to other people. There was a banging, thumping of wood on the other side of the wall. If Cait peered through the crumbling bricks, she could see another raider trying to kick down a heavy door.

"Pickman," he yelled, "you can't hide down there forever!"

Cait slunk into the room to her left. There were no raiders in this one, so it would be a good place to prepare herself before she jumped into another fight. The last one hadn't gone so well. There were three raiders, so if she was careful and made sure not to miss like last time, she would only have to grapple with one of them.

Then Cait noticed she was standing in a pool of blood.

She should have been more observant about the room she was wandering into. But to be honest, all she had noticed was that there were no enemies in it. So much of the Commonwealth was bloodsoaked, body-littered, that the stench of death and mounds of meat in this room hadn't seemed unusual to her. More raider bullshit.

But the meat and blood here was arranged in a fashion that was definitely _not_ the typical raider style.

Pickman's Gallery, she thought to herself. It was an art gallery.

The paintings on the wall - and the door, she now recalled - were painted with blood. The faces in the paintings were grotesque, twisted. Disturbed. And there was what she guessed was supposed to be s sculpture in the middle, made of mangled bodies and impaled heads. No wonder the raiders in this room. _I heard Pickman skinned Roy alive after he snatched him._ These were their friends.

Cait turned the corner and let loose a shotgun round, catching one of the raiders in front of her. The other one charged her, and she got her second round into his gut. The one on the other side of the wall, door-kicker, came and charged at her. Cait took the time he spent rounding the corner to re-load her weapon, but there wasn't enough time to raise and fire it. She bashed into his skull, and he stumbled back. Dazed. Not dead. She wasn't half as strong as she was used to being, without the Psycho. He lashed at her with a knife, catching her arm, and she kicked him back, firing a round into his chest.

Fuck. That had been close. Too close. She wasn't used to people getting back up after she hit them. Wasn't used to not being invincible, flying high on Psycho.

Cait made her way over to the door the raiders had been trying to break down. Whoever Pickman was, it seemed like he was on the other side. She knelt down in front of it, digging out her bobby pins and screwdriver, testing out the lock.

The bobby pin broke, almost immediately. Cait cussed under her breath, inserting another, being more careful with it this time. She twisted it to the right, just a little bit. _Snap_. Fuck. She dug out another one, twisting it just slightly to the left, and testing the tortion ever so gently with her screwdriver. _Snap_. She growled, putting another one it. And another. And another. He feet became littered with broken bobby pins and cuss words.

"Damn," she growled. "What the _hell's_ wrong with me?"

She couldn't fight properly, she couldn't pick locks. Lockpicking was a skill she'd promised herself she would never lose. And fighting was the only damn thing she was good for. And without the Psycho, she didn't have anything. Nothing. She was worth nothing.

She shoved in bobby pin after bobby pin, falling deeper into denial for close to an hour. If she could just pick this one lock. Then she could prove to herself that she was worth something. That Curie wasn't entirely wrong. If she could just prove to herself that she was good for _something_.

This time, when she reached for another bobby pin, her blunt nails scratched the empty cardboard bottom of the bobby pin box. Empty. She threw it across the room.

"Pickman! You can't hide forever, you sick bastard!"

There was still the sound of raiders shouting and thumping around upstairs. If Cait couldn't open the lock, at least she could clear the building. Or maybe let something get her. Since she wasn't good for anything.

The addictol wasn't working. She could feel it. She craved Psycho, itched for it. The addictol wasn't working, and she was still dying, and she didn't see anything that was even worth saving. Cait made her way upstairs.

She came to a full halt. There was a raider in front of her, taking a defensive position, leaning around the corner...away, from Cait. Her back was towards Cait, and she was looking for an enemy on the other side of the wall.

"Where'd that little bitch go?" the raider murmured to herself.

Was there someone else in here? Besides her and Pickman? Cait took her baseball bat out of her bag, raised it up over her head. Brought it down with all of her strength.

The raider stumbled back, looking hurt but relatively unharmed. _Shite_. What the fuck was this? She'd been able to kill super mutants with this bat before. Cait gave up and went for her shotgun instead.

She didn't make it before the raider got a shot off, and it hit her in the shoulder. Fucking hell, that hurt. She didn't have the Psycho to protect her. She could feel every nerve ending, every destroyed muscle in her shoulder, pulsing with pain. Cait cried aloud, stumbling backwards, losing her opportunity to shoot. For christ's sake, she'd gotten the jump on this one. How was she getting beaten? The raider reloaded her shitty pipe pistol, approaching Cait.

"First mistake," she said, "last mistake."

Cait got her gun up, but her shot went wide. Her vision was blurry. Had bullet wounds ever hurt this much before? Usually, they just made her angry. Everything just made her angry. Now she felt -

The raider crumpled to the ground in front of her, a laser cutting through the air, burning a hole in the back of her head. Cait stumbled to her feet.

"Cait?"

And that voice - what the hell? French accent, high-pitched. A little slurred.

Curie?!"

And there she was, braced with a laser rifle over the top of a bookcase on the other side of the room where she had sniped the raider that had been coming for Cait.

"Curie, what the fuck are ya doin' here?!"

"Cait! I awoke, and you vere gone! I - "

More raiders came into the room. Cait motioned for Curie to get down, diving behind a wall herself.

"It's Pickman!" one of them shouted. "He's in the fucking walls!"

 _He's in the what?_ Cait thought.

She peeked her head out from behind cover. Saw Curie looking back at her. And saw a pair of arms reach out from the splintered wood behind the bookshelves, wrapping around Curie and dragging her backwards into the walls.

" _Curie!_ " Cait shouted.

All three of the raiders turned on her, and Cait ducked back behind the wall. Someone had grabbed Curie. She could be dead already. And she'd come here for Cait, come after Cait because she'd woken up and Cait hadn't been there. And now, she couldn't even fight, couldn't even pick a damn lock.

Fuck it. Not today.

Cait dumped her backpack upside down, spilling needles of Psycho all over the floor. The addictol wasn't working anyway. She slammed two needles down in quick succession, not even waiting to feel them take effect before rounding the corner and firing her shotgun and the raider closest to her. The next one, she brought the butt of her gun down on his head. This time, it cracked clean through to the center of his skull, exposing his brains to the open air. The third one, she broke her neck with her bare hands.

Cait was back.

She shoved the bookshelf out of the way - it went crashing across the room - and found the opening in the wall Curie had disappeared into. She could hear her high-pitched voice, echoing in the basement below. Still alive.

Cait ducked behind the wall, dropping down to the floor below, and then into the basement. There was another work of art in progress down there, a paint can full of blood next to a sticky paintbrush and a canvas. Twisted black hands reaching their way towards a yellow eye, with a background of red blood. A mound of bodies and gore rested at the bottom of the stairs. And a passageway beyond, where the brick of the wall had been cleared away to connect with the sewer system. Cait plunged into it.

The damn raiders were in here too. Calling out for Pickman to come out. Cait recognized the tone. _Come out, come out, wherever you are_. She was close to the same herself. There was one in the room ahead of her, a tall, round room that branched off in several directions. Cait didn't even slow down. She ran straight at the raider in front of her, leaping towards her before she could even get her gun up and grabbing her face with her hand, dashing her skull against the corner of the brick stairs. Another one down.

She checked the branches quickly. One was caved in, the other mostly bricked up. She barreled into the third and final corridor, praying it led somewhere. She had to find Curie. It ended in a straight drop, down to the water. Cait skidded to a halt. There were raiders down this way, and she took a shot at one with her shotgun. He fell into the water.

"Cait!" she heard someone hiss.

She looked down. Across from her, a level down, was another corridor. Curie was poking her head out of it, taking cover from the raiders further down. She was alive. Thank god. Cait didn't hesitate, running to the edge and leaping across the gorge, landing in a crouch on the other side. She stood, balancing herself and ducking behind cover with Curie.

"Curie," she said, "how the hell - "

Curie hugged her, stumbling a bit. Right. She'd been drinking. Fuck.

"I am so glad I found you," she said. "When you were gone - I was so worried. And Monsieur Hancock told me where you 'ad gone - "

"I'm liable to choke that prick with his own flag," Cait growled. "Curie, ya shoulda stayed put. You're drunk, you're in a new body, you weren't that great in combat in t' first place - "

"I find combat can be quite sobering," Curie said, only swaying a little. "Also I threw up. Many, many times. I do not think there is much of the alcohol zat can be left inside me."

"Right," Cait said, running a hand down her face. "Curie, ya can't just - risk yer life like this. You're lucky t'be alive right now."

"As are you!" Curie said. "I came after you because I was worried, Cait. You think you are invincible, I see it when you fight. But you are not, and without support - one day, you vill not make it back."

She seemed to be choking up at the end of that. And Cait - Cait, who hadn't felt invincible at all, without the Psycho. Cait who had left Sanctuary to die. Cait who wasn't worth anything. Cait who was high as a fuckin' kite right now. Cait didn't know what to say to that.

"You hear me, Pickman! You're a dead man!"

Raiders were still shouting, still looking for Pickman. Cait shook herself.

"Well, lucky or not, we've gotta find us a way outta here, alright love? And it ain't gonna be the way we came."

Cait looked up to where she'd leaped from, about a floor above them and on the other side of a ditch of water. Not likely.

"Zis corridor is caved in. I checked. Monsieur Pickman said I would be safe here until it was over...but I do not think I want to wait for zis Pickman."

Cait shivered.

"You alright?" she finally asked.

Curie nodded.

"He said he 'ad no wish to hurt me. Zat I was 'not like ze others.' But...that only makes me wonder, who he considers to be 'the others.'"

"Right. We find our own way out then," Cait said, leaping down into the water and offering Curie her hand.

The corridors ahead of them only had a few raiders in them, and facing them was no longer a problem. It was the old teamwork Cait had enjoyed back at Greenetech Genetics. She took the one on the right, Curie the one on the left. Curie caught the machine gun turret with her laser rifle before Cait even saw it. Cait wondered if she could have cleared this place off of Psycho, with Curie by her side. With support.

But she was full of Psycho right now, so there was no way to be sure. No way to test that hypothesis. Cait didn't have long to live, and she doubted she'd ever be clean again.

They took out ten or so more raiders, and two turrets making their way through the tunnels. If anything, the raider population reassured Cait that there had to be a way out ahead. No way this many people were dumb enough to get themselves stuck in a hole. Well, they were raiders...

A voice echoed through the tunnels.

"Finally got you, Pickman," a man said. "Thought you could hunt and torture our people to your heart's content? I'm gonna enjoy killing you."

And it was too dark, they were moving too fast. Curie was drunk and Cait was high. Cait didn't see the drop until it was too late.

She dropped into the final room, just as the raiders opened fire. A figure on the other side of the room dove for cover, and one of the raiders turned on her as she was dusting herself off. She ducked behind a brick pillar, the heavy blast of her opponent's shotgun knocking the bricks lose and threatening to make it crumble.

A laser round found him from above. Curie. Cait turned her attention to the other raider, hitting him with her gun as he got close. He backed up, clutching the crack in his skull. Hard head. Cait put a round into his stomach, watched him drop to his knees, and then facefirst on the ground.

By the time she turned, Curie was on the ground with her, pointing her laser rifle at the other side of the room. A man stood there, hands up. Unarmed. Cait clutched her shotgun, uneasy. One round left. This was the one all these raiders were after. The one who had made that disturbed art upstairs. Pickman.

"That was close. Thank you," Pickman said, smiling to the two of them and giving a small bow. He straightened, his eyes landing on the bodies. "Those people deserved worse than death."

"Maybe you deserve the same," Cait snapped, jittery, her hands tightening on her weapon. Ready to use it like a club.

Pickman looked at her, and his smile wasn't as genuine as the one he gave to Curie. Curie 'wasn't like the others.' And Cait? Well, Cait was.

"So sayeth one born killer to another," Pickman said, almost disdainfully. "Regardless, I pay my debts."

"If I let you live," Cait snarled.

Curie held out a hand, eyes widening.

"Why did they vant you so badly?" Curie asked.

Pickman shrugged.

"A small disagreement. They objected to my hobby of collecting their heads."

Curie furrowed her brows for a moment, and then, something clicked. She took a shaky step back.

"You...you were responsible. For the bodies, on the first floor. Ze gallery."

"Yes, it is my gallery. My collection is not yet complete, but it is quite lovely, isn't it?"

"It is sick," Curie said.

"I'm helping you just by doing what I love," Pickman said. "What's one less raider? Why squander such gifts?"

"Cait," Curie said, "I see a ladder over there. Let us leave this place."

"Without my gift?" Pickman asked. He never stopped smiling. "Very well. Take it or leave it. But if you visit my house again, look deep within my painting "Picnic for Stanley" and you will find my gratitude."

"Cait," Curie said, inching closer to the ladder. "Let's go."

Cait looked at Pickman. Felt the Psycho pumping through her. The invincibility.

"What's one less raider?" Cait repeated, looking at Pickman.

And she saw how he looked at her. Knew what he saw in her. Cait had 'raider' written all over her. 'Ex-raider' at best. She'd spent years livin' with 'em, and she hated them too, but she knew that's how people saw her.

Pickman smiled.

"Nothing," he said. "One less raider is nothing at all."

"Then you won't mind if I exterminate the last one," Cait said, raising her shotgun.

"Cait!" Curie shouted.

It was too late. Pickman's suit stained itself with blood, and he was blasted back onto the bricks behind him. Curie rushed up to him, checking his pulse, fumbling around for a stimpack.

"Do you - do you have a stimpack?" Curie asked, voice pitched, strained.

Cait shook her head, mute in shock. She'd left her bag upstairs. All of her chems. Psycho and stimpacks alike. Curie worked over Pickman's body, trying to keep him alive. She didn't succeed. Curie's shoulders slumped.

Cait wasn't shocked at what she'd done. She'd done a lot worse than that. She was shocked at Curie's reaction, how she'd contextualized it. Shocked at how clearly she'd hurt Curie. Curie, who had come after Cait because she was worried.

"What is wrong with you?" Curie said, after a moment, shaking on the ground.

Cait didn't answer. Curie stood, turning to face Cait, advancing towards her.

"What is wrong with you?!" she repeated. "He vas not - he vas not attacking us. There was no reason to - "

"You said it yourself, right?" Cait said, voice husky. "What he did. It was sick. He was sick."

"So we spread more misery around? We continue killing?" Curie pushed Cait back, trying to get her attention, to reach her, to get her to listen. "I have another hypothesis, Cait, that malignant acts also act like a virus. Just as kindness can spread, so too can misery!"

"Then this whole world's fuckin' terminal!" Cait snapped. "All of humanity's caught asshole, Curie! And no amount of kindness is gonna fix that! Welcome to bein' human, Curie - _This_ is what humanity looks like!"

"You can't - you can't really think that. Cait?"

"It's all - " Cait's voice broke. "It's all I've ever known."

Dismembered bodies and blood and screaming. _Come out come out wherever you are_. Killing and gettin' hurt and lashing out for no good reason. These were things that had been familiar to Cait her whole life. Malignant acts.

"I refuse to accept that. I vill never accept that. Not after all I have done, to become human."

Cait stepped back.

"Maybe I - " she said. She couldn't get her voice to work right. "Maybe I'm contagious, Curie. You shouldn't come near me." Cait smiled, half-hearted, through tears threatening to break free of her eyes. "You'll catch asshole."

"Cait, zis is not true - " Curie said, inching closer.

Cait stepped back further.

"You don't know what I am," Cait said, "what I've done."

"Cait, you have had a very hard life. I know zis. But are very strong, also. Brave and free. You are not 'terminal.'"

Cait snorted, almost hysterical.

"I'm an ex-slave, what snuck and stole her way out," she said. "And maybe you're alright with that. But my story didn't end there. Sure, I got out. But instead of headin' off to try and repair the shambles of me life, I gave in to me rage and I headed home. You can imagine the look on me parents faces when I kicked open their door. What you can't imagine is what they looked like after..." Cait looked up, making dead eye contact with Curie, "...after I emptied me gun into them."

Just like Pickman, lying dead on the floor. Just like all the raiders in this damn complex. Just like all the triggermen in the warehouses. Whitechapel Charlie's 'rat problem.'

Curie stepped towards Cait, and Cait didn't back away. She waited for Cait to yell at her, to push her around. Hell, maybe she'd hit her, scream at her, kill her. Cait didn't care.

Curie wrapped her arms around Cait, hugging her. It was an awkward, clumsy hug. Curie was still learning to use her arms, her legs, her new human body. But it was tight. Fierce. Brave and free. Cait's eyes widened, and she clutched a hand around her mouth firmly to stifle a sob.

She'd been awake for too long. That was it.

"You did what you had to do," Curie said.

"Did I?" Cait choked. "When I close me eyes, all I can see is their faces twisted with fear. And then me mind starts wanderin' and I start judgin' myself. And - and it's rippin' me the fuck apart. You think I inject myself with all that shite and drink myself drunk because I'm a "tough Irish gal?" I do it so I can forget and move on with me miserable life. So there you are. That's me. The real me. The entire flawed package known as Cait, stripped bare for your perusal."

Curie stepped back, wiping moisture away from her eyes that Cait had worked so hard to keep her own eyes clear of.

"I'm proud of you," she said.

Cait's heart skipped a beat.

"I - what?" she said. "I knew I was takin' a chance tellin' you all this, but I never expected you to say you were...proud of me."

"Cait, it has not been easy. You cannot blame yourself for not being invincible. I am proud of you for making it through all of that, even if you caught a little bit of asshole along ze way, and a few bad habits. And now, you have support. Neither of us need be invincible, no?"

Cait stumbled back. Thought a moment. Took a seat.

"Are you alright?"

"I - yes," Cait said. "I'm just...not used, to lashing out at someone, and gettin' a hug after. I guess. Usually I lash out, and that's it."

Curie hummed, sitting next to her, leaning her head against the brick.

"Per'aps my hypothesis is not so foolproof after all," she said. "Perhaps it is possible to cultivate benign acts in isolation. To lash out, and receive a hug. To be kind, when others are cruel. To be brave, when all you have ever known is fear. Do you not think so?"

"I dunno," Cait said.

She closed her eyes. She was so, so tired. The Psycho was wearing off, and now she had nothing. No addictol, no caps, no Psycho. But she didn't feel the panic creeping up on her. She cracked open one eye, giving Curie a small smile.

"Though I suppose," she said, "there's one way to go about testin' a hypothesis like that."

Curie smiled back, leaning her head on Cait's shoulder and closing her eyes also.


	10. Chapter 10

Cait didn't sleep for long.

Even after they'd made their way back to their rented room at the Hotel Rexford, sometime between five and six in the morning, the sun just starting to give some cloudy lighting to the streets. Curie had fallen asleep easily. For a while, Cait had watched her from the mattress next to hers, watched her breathing peacefully in her sleep. An autonomic function. For all Curie had worried about forgetting to breathe, it came naturally enough when she wasn't thinking about it.

Cait had timed her short breaths with Curie's, tried to relax. There was still Psycho in her veins. Less than there could have been, though. Like trying to sleep with a light pointed in your face. Irritating, but not impossible. And Cait had been awake for days.

She slept for a few hours. Two or three. She dreamt of her parents, and all the gruesome holes she'd pumped into them.

She hadn't returned with the plan to murder them. Maybe some fantasies of hurting them. But that had never been the goal. She had still wanted that love that had never existed. She had wanted to come back and make them answer for what they'd done. To make them tell her how sorry they were. To make them regret it. To make them realize she was worth more than the measly caps they'd sold her for.

When they saw her, the expressions on their faces. The shock. Then her father had started to open his mouth. That's what had done it. Those words, the last words she'd ever heard him say, when he sold her. _Payment up front_. They were the only words she'd imagined him saying for five years of enslavement. And when he opened his mouth, she had been so sure she was going to hear them again. And that she had to stop it.

So she'd opened fire. And in her few, scattered dreams, that was all she saw. The muzzle flash of her shotgun, the splatter of gore on the inside of a trailer. After a few hours of that, she gave up, rolling out of bed while Curie continued to sleep beside her.

Since leaving Curie to wake up alone hadn't ended so well last time, Cait left word at the front desk that she was just headed across the street to the old state house. Clair harrumphed her and told her she wasn't a post office, but Cait knew if Curie came looking Clair wasn't going to be an ass about it.

Hancock was in his usual spot, high as shit on Jet, Fahrenheit standing in the shadows. Cait gave a nod and a knowing smirk to Fahrenheit, remembering her practically stuttering the other day around Curie. She didn't flinch, but Cait hadn't thought she would.

"Hey Hancock," Cait said, taking a seat on the sofa opposite him and resting her boots on the table.

"Cait," Hancock said, still leaning back, slowly breaking out in a smile. High as balls. "How's my little scout doing? You find out what's happening at Pickman Gallery?"

"Let's just say Pickman's art isn't going to have much resale value once those bodies start decaying," Cait said.

Hancock blinked once. Too high even for Cait's level of subtlety, it seemed. She sighed.

"Pickman's Gallery was home to a sicko named Pickman, who hunted raiders and used their bodies to make art. That's why the area was silent. But I iced him, so you don't gotta worry about 'quiet' no more, that's for sure."

Hancock sat up, shaking some of the Jet haze off of him, sucking air between his teeth.

"Woah," he said. "Seriously? That's...messed up. Even for this town. You say you iced him?"

"Yeah. He's real dead."

"I was only paying for reconnaissance, Cait."

"Well, you hired a blunt force weapon, and you got a blunt force weapon. What, you mad I killed him?"

"Not a chance," Hancock said. "But it sure was a hell of a lot more risk for you. You didn't have to do that much."

"What, are ya tryna talk me into a bonus? I'll take one, if you're offerin'."

Hancock snorted.

"Nah," he said, "I was just surprised. You've helped me out big time, twice now."

"I was gettin' paid."

"No harm in that," Hancock said. "Fahrenheit? It was two-fifty for this job."

Fahrenheit nodded and started rummaging around in a drawer.

"Look, I'm just saying," Hancock said, "I appreciate it. Love to have you work for me again sometime."

Cait nodded, taking a sack of caps Fahrenheit handed her. She didn't bother to count it.

"Maybe," Cait said. If she lived through the week. "Depends. You know any place where eggheads gather? Near Diamond City maybe?"

Hancock sat back, absentmindedly taking a puff from his inhaler.

"Eggheads? What kind of eggheads?"

"I dunno. Curie likes science shit. And I need a reason to head to Diamond City. I'd like to give her a reason, too."

"You don't think she'd come with otherwise?"

"I think she would. But then I'd have to tell her my reason."

Hancock's face softened, an empathy settling there. His black gaze walked up and down her hollowed-out cheekbones, her collarbones jutting out from her chest, her sickly pallor. It wasn't hard to put together, when you were a junkie yourself.

"She doesn't know you're in withdrawal?"

"She knows a little. Not enough. And I don't...I don't wanna disappoint her any more than I already have."

Hancock nodded, thinking for a moment.

"It's a stretch, but...there's the science center, right in Diamond City."

"Sounds perfect," Cait said, furrowing her brow. "It's called a science center? Why's it a stretch?"

"It's, eh..." Hancock scratched his jaw. "I guess you could say it's usually more for kids? They've got a school there in the city, and the kids go over there for field trips. It's got some good equipment, though, and it's run by Doctor Duff and Professor Scara. They're good people."

"Right," Cait said, standing. "Well, that's at least a better reason."

"Now if you really wanna find Curie some serious science shit," Hancock said, "track down one of those old vaults. They're dangerous, and pretty fucked up if you ask me, but those Vault-Tec motherfuckers knew some science. The data in those vaults is priceless, in the right hands."

"Thanks, Hancock. I'll keep it in mind."

"Good luck," he said. "And come see me if you're in search of more work. I'll pay you better than I would a stranger."

"Funny," Cait said, "I thought I got hired 'cause I _was_ a stranger."

She made for the stairs, satchel of caps in her hand.

"See you around, Hancock."

Back in the Hotel Rexford, Curie was lounging, half-asleep, on one of the sofas in the waiting room. Cait nudged it with her foot.

"Ya know, we rented a room," she said. "With a bed."

Curie stretched, yawning.

"I did not intend to fall asleep down here. I wanted to wait until you got back."

"What, no chasing after me with a laser pistol this time?"

Curie grinned.

"I cannot always go running after you. People would talk, no? Besides, Clair told me where you were. I was not worried."

Cait sat down on the couch next to her, gesturing at Curie's laser pistol.

"Where'd you get that thing, anyway?" she asked.

"I bought it. From ze store, Kill or be Killed. I figured, it is not so different from ze laser on my old body, no?"

"I guess that's for you to say. How'd you find aiming it?"

"Difficult. KL-E0 showed me how to operate ze weapon once I 'ad purchased it, but I used to have a very advanced targeting system. Now, I 'ave only guesswork."

"Well," Cait said, "your guesswork saved my life. Thanks for that."

"Of course. You 'ave saved my life many times, too. We are friends, no?"

"Friends," Cait agreed.

They settled into an amicable silence for a moment, before Curie admitted:

"I...may need to buy another toothbrush."

"What?" Cait asked. "You need two?"

"No, I - " Curie hesitated. "My first attempt to use it did not go...smoothly."

"I - " Cait stopped, a little shaken. How many ways were there to fuck up brushing your teeth? Cait couldn't claim to be well-practiced, but -

"Do not - do not laugh," Curie said, quickly, and Cait saw how self-conscious she was all of the sudden.

"I ain't laughin. Not about to throw bricks from a glass house, here," Cait said.

Curie half-smiled, then shifted again, wringing her hands together. After a moment, she spoke.

"I owe you so very much, and I do not mean to sound ungrateful. But...I fear I am barely holding myself together."

"Hey," Cait said. "I'm here for you, Curie. Just like how you're here for me."

"I - " Curie started, "I struggle just to master basic functioning. How to brush ze teeth, how to operate with only two hands, et cetera. I find myself running out of energy every single night, like clockwork. How can I be expected to do anything worthwhile in just 16 hours every day? And, too, I am so full of inconsequential thoughts, feelings. How do you do everything with this whirlwind in ze head?"

Cait wanted to be there for Curie, but she doubted she was qualified for giving out life advice. Her answer to a whirlwind in her own head, or even a single emotion, to be honest, was a strong drink.

"You're managing well so far. You stormed Pickman's Gallery yesterday."

"But not like you did! You make it look so effortless. Like breathing. But for me, it is so hard to focus. To do research. And inspiration is as elusive as ever. I fear I will never contribute anything to the world."

Cait remembered watching her breathing last night, natural when she wasn't thinking about it. Autonomic.

"You've been human for a day," Cait said. "Give yourself a week, at least."

They both laughed, and Cait was grateful to see genuine humor come over Curie's face, banish some of the anxiety there.

"But really," she said. "I know you can change the world, Curie. Just give it time."

Curie gave a light grimace. Not agreeing, not disagreeing.

"In this maelstrom, it is hard to see the shore. The saving grace in all of this is you. As a robot, I had much appreciation for you. But now... it is deeper. I am still loyal. But now I do this because I want to. Because you are...you are very important to me. Last night I was constantly realizing - if harm should befall you - "

"I think you're falling into the whirlwind again, Curie," Cait said, noticing how her breathing was speeding up. "It's no use focusin' on what could happen, or what could have happened. Right now, we're both safe. That's what matters, ain't it?"

"Yes, I suppose so."

"And hey, toothbrushes are cheap."

Curie laughed again.

"I - I broke mine. Snapped the poor thing in two with my fingers. Too tight a grip. It is a delicate instrument, zis toothbrush."

"Can I laugh now?"

"No, you may not," Curie said, laughing herself.

"Well," Cait said, "after we buy a new toothbrush, I was thinkin' we could head to Diamond City."

"Oh?" Curie asked. "What is in Diamond City?"

And here came the lie. Well, a half-lie, half-truth. Cait's tongue felt numb in her mouth.

"There's a science center up there. Hancock told me about it. A Doctor Duff and Professor Scara run the place."

"Is zis an institute of learning?" Curie said, sitting suddenly on the edge of the sofa.

"So I hear," Cait said.

"Zen we must leave immediately!"

Curie was already on her feet, laser pistol in hand, ready to storm the Commonwealth. Her stomach growled, loudly.

"Maybe some lunch first?" Cait said.

"Per'aps zis would be best," Curie admitted.

They ordered some cheap canned food from the front desk, ate it right there on the couches in the lobby. Cait didn't have her backpack anymore, just the satchel the caps had come in and her shotgun. She was low on ammo, too. Most of her rounds had been in her backpack. She thought about going back for it. Pickman's Gallery was pretty much clear, after all. But...all of her Psycho was there, too. And she didn't want to have to make the choice between taking it or not.

They picked up ammo and a new toothbrush on the way out of Goodneighbor. The effects of withdrawal were starting to wear on Cait, and she had a couple hour's walk ahead of her, so she grabbed some booze to tide her over as well. Daisy didn't have anything good, just some shitty moonshine. Not like she could actually taste with her tongue at this point, though.

It wasn't far to Diamond City after that, and the route was relatively familiar. They'd paced a lot of this area when they'd first met, tracking the courser. Things had been so different then. Cait had barely bothered to speak to Curie, hadn't really even considered her human. Why bother talking to a toaster? But even before Curie had started to look human, she'd saved Cait's life, again and again. Caught her when she fell in the Greenetech Genetics building. Called her a friend. It had changed their dynamic. Somewhere along the way, their travels had begun to be filled with light, playful banter. And now, they could broach deeper topics, as they picked their way through the rubble.

"Zese traveling doctors," Curie was complaining, as she gingerly picked her way through a pile of crumbling bricks that used to be a shop wall, "zey hoard their knowledge. In my travels with Nate, it was a Doc Weathers who told me zat most people look at medicine as a business these days, and zat it 'makes no sense to share stuff with your competition'. It is abominable. How can zey expect to expand their knowledge if they do not share their findings with fellow academics?"

"Most people around here are focused on the short term, love," Cait said.

"Well, I am not so near-sighted. I plan to organize a conference of fellow physicians. So we can share our theories. The medical arts will not advance unless we share our findings with each other."

"Yeah? That'd be tough. Maybe doable, though. If you could prove it was worthwhile."

"One day, I would like to establish a hospital. Where medical practitioners could come and learn and perform dangerous procedures. I could base my conference out of zis hospital, make it a center of learning known across ze Commonwealth!"

"You got big plans, dontcha?"

"I - " Curie started, then hesitated. "I do not know. I feel - zey could be bigger. But then, can I even accomplish zis? When I must sleep all the time and eat all the time and cannot even hold a toothbrush without it breaking?"

Cait chewed her lip. She didn't know much about big plans. She'd never had any. Her biggest plan had only ever been to run away, and she'd gotten mixed results with that one. She didn't know anything about the kind of goals Curie was chasing after. The kind of heights she wanted to achieve. Curie always looked at the world as though there was an adventure there that was only just beginning. Cait had always looked at it as a painful ending that dragged on too long.

"A friend once told me," Cait said, "that neither of us needs to be invincible, as long as we've got each other. Support. I'm not much for science, Curie, but I've got your back."

Curie smiled.

"Thank you. Zis makes me feel...better. Calm."

"One step at a time. We'll start with this science center. Maybe the scientists there can be your first members."

Cait hated to get Curie's hopes up about something that would probably be a bust, but hey, who knew. They were still scientists. An egghead was an egghead, even if they were used to working with kids, right?

Cait had never been to Diamond City, for good reason. Goodneighbor was about as civilized as she'd ever been capable of handling. Diamond City was the kind of place where they took offence to people fighting in the streets. Might even shoot you for it. They didn't allow ghouls, super mutants, or synths. Cait had warned Curie to keep her synthetic status on the down-low in Diamond City, but she was worried about her own status as well. She had more scars than your average scavver.

The city sprawled out before them as the came to the top of the stairs and climbed their way back down again. The main stairs led right into the market, where vendors were hawking services like haircuts, chems, scrap, and baseball bats. There was an open stand to the right called the Mega Surgery Center, where a man with black hair in a lab coat was brewing something in a flask, the only one not hawking his services. Doctor Sun, maybe?

Their path was suddenly blocked by a guard dressed in old, marked-up baseball gear and a helmet. He stepped up to them, threatening, forcing them to stop in their tracks. Cait's fingers itched into a fist, but punching a Diamond City guard was a good way to get both her and Curie killed.

"I know an ex-raider when I see one," he growled at her.

Cait's blood froze in her veins. Was she about to be shot, here, on the spot? Was she that far gone that she automatically registered to people as a raider, even if she wasn't hostile? Suddenly, Curie was between Cait and the guard.

"And I know a bully when I see one, Monsieur," she said, almost standing on her tiptoes to catch his eye.

Cait couldn't help but smile. _Fuck 'em up, Curie_ , she thought. The guard glowered down at her for a moment, then stepped away.

"Make sure your 'friend' plays nice inside the wall, you hear?" he said.

Curie directed her middle finger at him.

Well, that was one way to enter a city.

They got directions to the science center, which was a little down some alleyways but not so far that they got lost. A big blue building, with tons of whirring computers and lab stations inside, two scientists arguing lightly with each other in the back.

"Professor! I have a new theory on how the institute makes synths!"

"Oh no. We banned talking about this, remember? After last time? The shouting? Me sleeping on the cold floor of the lab for three nights?"

"That was _your_ choice - "

"And seriously, growing synths from the ground using recombinant plant nuclei? I mean, how could they even - "

"Ah ha! You _do_ want to talk about it!"

"Uh...oh look! We have a visitor," one of the arguing scientists said, gesturing towards Cait and Curie hovering awkwardly in the doorway. "Doctor Duff, dear, if you could bother them while I walk away from this conversation..."

"Think you can take it from here?" Cait asked, as Doctor Duff approached.

Curie stiffened in surprise.

"Do you have someplace else to be?"

"I didn't get much sleep last night," Cait said, truthfully. Half-truth, half-lie. "I'll pass out if I stand much longer. Besides, I wouldn't be able to follow."

"You underestimate yourself," Curie said. "But yes, you should rest."

"I'll get us a room at the Dugout Inn. Good luck here, Curie."

"Thank you. Rest well!"

Cait nodded shortly and stepped backwards out of the door.

She couldn't help glancing over her shoulder as she walked across the marketplace to the Mega Surgery Center. Seeing if Curie ran after her, for whatever reason. At this point, she'd be caught in an addiction _and_ a lie. But no one followed. Cait found the man in the lab coat, no longer brewing a concoction but writing observations on a clipboard.

"Are you Doctor Sun?" she asked.

"A new patient," the doctor sighed, almost to himself, looking Cait up and down, "a new file to open. Do you have a legitimate medical concern, or this about our Facial Reconstructive services?"

"No, I'm, uh - " Cait stuttered. This surgery was too open, too out in the middle of everything. Fred's basement had been leagues better. Creepy and musty, but private at least. "I've - I've got an addiction. To Psycho. Fred Allen up in Goodneighbor said you might be able to help."

Doctor Sun grimaced, stepping towards her and shining a light in her eye, taking her pulse. Cait forced herself to hold still, tried not to lash out. She didn't want Curie to know, but god, she wished she were here right now. Just having her nearby would have made it better.

"You're strung out all right," he said. "I got something that can clean you up."

"Not addictol," Cait said, voice a little hoarse. "I've tried. Again, and again. Doesn't work."

"Yes, I doubt it would, with your level of addiction. Addictol's a quick clean, for the blood, but I suspect your long-term use has saturated your tissue to a deeper extent than the addictol can reach. I have a solution, but it won't be pleasant. Or cheap."

"How much?"

"Two hundred caps. Chem called Fixer, from out West. It should expel enough of the Psycho from your system to kick the addiction."

"Deal," Cait said, handing over the caps.

It was everything she had, so she just took off her satchel and gave it to him. Doctor Sun looked up from his notes and looked at her, really looked at her, for the first time.

"...people don't usually take that price without arguing," he said, slowly.

"I gotta get clean," Cait said, shrugging.

After a moment, Doctor Sun handed over the chem, a metal tin with a needle and needle kit inside. Well, at least she would know how to use it. Cait closed the tin.

"It's Sun, by the way," Doctor Sun said, pronouncing it like 'moon.' "Sun, not _suhn_."

"Cait," Cait said, nodding. "Thanks, Doctor Sun."

The Dugout Inn was right behind the Mega Surgery Center, just past the butcher shop. Place was kind of dingey, not as fancy as the Hotel Rexford, but relatively clean and probably safer than Goodneighbor. Cait rented a room with two beds from a man named Yefim.

The room was a little bare. The beds didn't have blankets, but it wasn't particularly cold. There was a single dresser and what was maybe a rug strewn across the floor. Cait sat down on the edge of the bed and opened up the tin. There was a full needle kit in here, for proper injections, not just shooting up the way junkies did. Cait tied the rubber string around her arm, fingers a little unfamiliar with the motion. But the needle was easy enough to figure out. She took off the stopper, took a breath, and plunged the needle down.

She could tell the Fixer wasn't going to be fun before she took the rubber off of her arm. Already, her arm was sweating, felt uncomfortably inside-out. She didn't want to take the rubber off her arm, to break that barrier and allow that feeling to reach the rest of her. She wanted to at least have a drink, to give her a protective haze from what was about to happen. But the Fixer would pull that out too. It would be a waste of booze.

Fuck it. Cait took the rubber off of her arm, feeling the Fixer make its way through her system, the way you could feel strong liquor burn its way down your throat when you drank it. The Fixer burned, it twisted, made her feel like she was at once hollow and filled with acid. She grunted, lying back on the bed and clenching her fists tight.

 _Rest well_ , Curie had said.

Cait didn't do much resting.

She thrashed, kicked, muffled screams against the mattress, muffled sobs there too. Her mattress was wet from sweat and she could hardly breathe, could hardly focus. _How do you do everything with this whirlwind in ze head?_ The truth was, Cait hadn't learned how to be human either. She'd just been faking it, getting by on booze and Psycho and bravado. She didn't have any answers for Curie.

It was hours later that Cait finally got ahold of herself. She didn't feel good. Nauseous, dizzy, a little irritable. But the worst had passed. Her mattress was gross as hell. Cait picked it up and flipped it over to the fresh side. Well, fresher side.

The sun was setting when she stumbled out of the Dugout Inn. Curie hadn't been waiting in the lobby, so Cait made her way back over to the science center, hoping she'd be able to fake human enough in front of Curie and the other two scientists. If not, she could always say she was drunk.

But Curie and two scientists was not what waited for her within the science center. What waited for her was a handfull of screaming children.

"No! Look at mine!" one of them said, running by with a piece of corn.

"Your's is shit! Mine is _orange_ ," another said, pummeling the first child with a carrot.

"Peter! Language!" a Miss Nanny robot said, herding the fighting children away from each other.

Cait blinked. The Miss Nanny robot whirred a little, just like Curie used to, and took her in.

"Ah! A late arrival. I'm afraid the students have all finished their presentations, and I doubt they can be persuaded upon to present a second time in all this ruckus,"

"I - that's fine," Cait said, spotting Curie in rapt conversation with a child on the other side of the room. "What's going on, anyway?"

"Oh, today is a special field trip day for the children! Last week they all chose a crop to research and present on, and today is the culmination of their efforts!"

"Huh," Cait said. "Well, that's - they seem excited about it."

"Yes. I believe Miss Curie has helped very much enliven them with her questions. It's so delightful to see more adults taking an interest in education. Are you a friend of hers?"

"Yeah," Cait said, smiling to be able to say so. "I'm Cait. You are?"

"I am Miss Edna. I help teach the school with Mister Zwicky - Mister Zwicky is the teacher over there." Miss Edna gestured with her robotic arm. "Isn't he wonderful? I mean - knowledgeable?"

Cait furrowed her brow a bit.

"Right," she said, not reading into that.

Miss Edna's voice lowered.

"May I ask you a question, Miss Cait?" she said. "I just...don't get to talk to many adults."

"I just got here," Cait said. "Are you sure I'm the one to ask? I don't have a lot of answers."

"From ze way Miss Curie talks about you, I think you might."

Oh, shite. What the hell had Curie said about her? Cait sighed.

"Alright," she said. "Ask away."

"It's just...family. It is important, yes? This thing called "love" I hear the children talk about. I think they need that to learn."

 _A child needs love_. Curie had said that once. She'd meant it kindly, and Cait had snapped at her. _I didn't need anything. Then, or now_. She still felt uncomfortable under the weight of the phrase. The absoluteness of it. If a child needed love, and didn't get it, then what? Was that child broken, forever? Faking human with booze and Psycho and bravado?

"A child... _deserves_ , love," Cait said, slowly. "Doesn't mean they always get it, or that they need it, to learn, or grow, or anythin' like that. Kindness can be cultivated in isolation, Curie told me that. But they deserve it, regardless of whether they need it or not."

"They deserve love," Miss Edna mused. "Do you think you can have this love for someone, even if the two of you are very, very different?"

Cait's eyes flashed over to Mister Zwicky. No way. But hey, who was she to judge? She wasn't far from a crush on a Miss Nanny robot herself. Curie saw her, finally, and started almost frantically waving her over.

"I think you deserve love, too," Cait said, pushing herself off of the wall.

"I...thank you. You have helped me make up my mind about something."

"Good luck," Cait said, watching Miss Edna _whirr_ away.

Stranger things had happened.

Curie was very engaged with a kid somewhere between ten and twelve years old, who was quickly explaining relatively simple facts about mutfruit to Curie.

"And it grows on a short little bush-like tree, and it has yellow leaves, and it stings a bit when you eat it, but that's just because of the radiation, um, and they call it mutfruit because it's mutated fruit, isn't that cool? And they're very low-maintenance, which means they don't need too much work to grow, and um, that makes them a pretty popular plant, but it can't be the only plant because one time we got a surplus mutfruit shipment and my family only ate mutfruit for a month and I thought I would lose my mind, but um, then we got some brahmin steak so it was alright, and also they're bumpy around the edges, and the exterior is tougher than the interior to fight the elements, and um - "

"Why, this is all marvelous," Curie said, "but I believe I am hearing some facts repeated, which I have heard from you before. Would it not be more prudent to write everything down, zat way you would know what information is known, so zat we may then explore ze unknown?"

"That's a great idea!" the kid said. "I've actually got a notebook right here, I could - "

The kid stopped, eyes narrowing.

"Hey! Are you trying to trick me into writing a report?"

"By no means! But perhaps reports have more value than you place upon them, no?"

"Maybe," the kid said. "I just think mutfruits are cool."

"A sound hypothesis indeed," Curie said, ruffling the kid's hair.

"Don't use those science-y terms on me. Mister Zwicky keeps trying to convince me to study science and work at the science center when I grow up, but I don't want to! I'd rather be a Security officer. That way I can hit people who deserve it!"

Curie laughed, covering her mouth as if to hide the fact that she was laughing.

"You remind me of someone," Curie said.

"Ha-ha," Cait mimicked. "I think this kid's got the right idea."

"Erin," Curie said, still laughing a little, "I assure you, you can do both. But sometimes, you will get to hit people with science helping you."

"Like - like a super sledge? Or a power fist? Hydraulics and stuff? I could use science to hit people even harder!"

"That's the spirit!" Cait said, a little dazedly.

"Alright, children, it is time we let Doctor Duff and Professor Scara rest," Miss Edna said, gathering all the kids in the direction of the door.

"Yes. Please. Thank god," Cait heard Professor Scara mutter under her breath.

"I think we are a bad influence on children," Cait said.

"I taught Erin the middle finger," Curie said.

"She already knew it," Doctor Duff assured her.

It was dark by now, but there wasn't the usual ruckus in the streets as Cait and Curie found their way to the Dugout Inn to sleep for the night. The usual crashing of bottles, screaming, laughing, was absent. Nothing like the roar of the Combat Zone, or the noise of Goodneighbor, or even the general din the ruins of downtown at night. It was creepy. It was supposed to be safer, but a place like this was supposed to be safe against people like Cait. All the silence made her feel was unwelcome.

But this time, Curie was with her. And with her warmth next to her, it wasn't so hard to accept the fact that she wasn't invincible, after all. That maybe that was okay.


	11. Chapter 11

The night did not go easy on Cait. She'd gone through the worst effects of the Fixer already, but there was still this grinding, twisting nausea in her that had her heaving every couple of minutes, despite the ever dwindling contents of her stomach. She gagged until she was retching emptily over the toilet, let the nausea pass. Washed her face, brushed her hair back in the grimy bathroom mirror. Made her way back to her room and crawled back into bed. She was so tired. Days and days without sleep, or with only minimal efforts at sleep, and yet there was this itching in her veins, this raw rusty scraping clean of them, that kept her awake. Kept her shambling to the public restroom and throwing up anything she could.

She guessed it was the Fixer, still trying to get any trace of the Psycho out of her system. _Addictol's a quick clean, for the blood, but I suspect your long-term use has saturated your tissue to a deeper extent than the addictol can reach._ Saturated her tissue. What did it take, to get a seven-year addiction out of your skin? Your organs? Your liver and kidney and heart?

The bathroom floor was too dirty for even Cait to lay down on, but she craved the cool sensation of tile against her skin, always had when she was feeling ill. So she crawled on top of the sink in the corner, set her feet on the edge, leaned back against the tiles of the wall. She'd slept in far less comfortable places. Cait turned her head a little to the side, stared at what little she could make out of her reflection in the two hundred year old mirror. Tried to imagine she was looking better, healthier, less junk-ied.

But she wasn't that good at imagining.

The nausea had mostly passed by the time she finally returned to the room for good, and she was feeling a bit better, if still a little...twisted, inside. So it was twice as disheartening that Curie immediately jumped up on seeing her enter, tried to guide her too take a seat.

"Cait!" she exclaimed, "you look terrible!"

"Thanks, love."

"I - of course I do not mean - I only meant that - "

"I'm teasin', Curie. I know what you mean. I'm - hungover," Cait lied.

"Hungover?"

"Yeah. I got absolutely sloshed last night instead of takin' a nap."

"You were drunk when you came to see me at the science center? I did not even notice. You seemed very...cognisant. I...heard vat you said to Miss Edna."

Cait raised her eyebrows, shaking some of the headache off to give Curie an appreciative laugh.

"Nothin' wrong with yer audio circuits now, is there? Some damn fine ears you got on you."

Curie's lips twitched.

"I had heard Erin repeat the same facts about mutfruits one time too many. I vould 'ave listened to anything else within earshot."

"Yeah? How do I rank up, then? More interesting than a mutfruit?"

"I found your hypothesis...leagues better than my own, to be honest."

 _A child...deserves, love. Doesn't mean they always get it, or that they need it, to learn, or grow, or anythin' like that. Kindness can be cultivated in isolation, Curie told me that. But they deserve it, regardless of whether they need it or not._

"Hmm," Cait said. "I had some help in developing it. It's only fair to give my co-scientist some credit, ain't it?"

They smiled at each other for a moment. Curie really did have such nice eyes. And such a soft smile. And lips. Really, really soft lips.

A burst of pain shot through Cait's head, and she winced, rubbing her temples.

"Ah! But you are still hungover. Per'aps some water? We can purchase some from Monsieur Vladim - "

Cait held up her hand, shutting her eyes and trying to calm her stomach, which was acting up again.

"Slow down, love. First of all, I'm broke."

"You are broken?!"

"No, I'm _broke_. Poor, bankrupt, bust, shittfaced, out of caps - "

"But you 'ad plenty of caps in Goodneighbor, I saw for myself!"

"Yeah, and then I got _wasted_ , and now I'm broke. I figured I'd find meself a quick job here, I'm sure one of t' vendors has somethin' they want shot or killed or cleared, and it'll give you more time at the science center - "

"I do _not_ think so!" Curie said, stomping her foot a little indignantly. "Haven't we been talking so much about support? Working together? Did I not go running off to Pickman's Gallery specifically because I know you 'ave a penchant for reckless endangerment?"

"This isn't the same. This is a job, for me, because I need the money. I'll earn it meself."

"We are friends! If you need a job, then I need a job! If you are broke," Curie said, storming over to the garbage bin by the door for emphasis and turning her purse of caps upside down overtop of it, "then I too am broke!"

The trash bin was not a solid trash bin. It was a wire trash bin, with openings on the side. The caps came spilling out every direction, scattering themselves across the cement floor of their room. Silence followed, and Cait slowly put her head in her hands.

"Oh my god," she said, trying desperately not to laugh. "Fine."

It took them about ten full minutes to collect the caps off of the floor, but once they thought they'd gotten all of them, they made their way out to the lobby of the Dugout Inn. The couches were full of hungover patrons nursing their wounds. Any other time in her life, Cait would probably have loved to party in this place. Word around town was that the booze here was strong - real strong. But as it was, anything she drank she'd probably just throw up.

It was Curie who walked right up to the bar and began talking to the bartender, Vladim. Cait made a beeline for the bounty board, which she'd seen several times last night. She pulled off a single folded-up note nailed to it, squinting at it in the poor lighting.

 _Open notice to anyone with a gun and some ambition._

 _Feral Ghoul activity is on the rise near Mass Pike Tunnel. They may not have much in the way of supplies, but they congregate near areas with good salvage. Plus, ridding the world of these monsters will bring a smile to your face._

 _Keep what you kill. No other reward given._

Not a great offer, but ghouls were easy to kill and the loot wouldn't be half-bad. Curie waved her over to the bar excitedly, and Cait pocketed the note.

"Cait!" Curie said. "Monsieur Vladim says he has some work for us, if we would be interested."

Oh boy. He probably wanted them to clean up that shitty public bathroom or something.

"Curie, I don't think you and I have the same idea of what a job is. I meant like, killin' something."

"Oh?" Vladim said, taking Cait in. "You are mercenary?"

"No," Cait said flatly.

"But, you just said job is killing people. But job is not mercenary?"

"My job is being an asshole. Sometimes people pay me for it."

Vladim laughed, a full-bellied laugh that had him clutching the bar to stay upright.

"You! I like you. I pay you extra!"

Cait sighed.

"Fine, I'll bite. What's the job?"

If it was serving drinks, Cait was going back to bed.

"The job is my good friend, Earl."

"Right," Cait said, "time to go."

"No!" Vladim corrected, "Is not what you think! Earl went missing, few days back. I want you to find out what happened. Security does nothing but yell at me for asking about it."

"Security yells at you for askin'?"

"Vladim was telling me how Diamond City is very afraid of ze Institute," Curie chimed in, "and everyone assumes it was ze Institute that took him. So? Security takes no questions. Zey are afraid. But we are not!"

"We ain't?"

"We killed a courser, you and I."

"Damn!" Vladin said, slapping the table with his hand. "You kill courser? Really? Two of you? Now that is a story I want to hear. Not like _Hawthorne's shitty monster stories!_ "

Vladim's voice rose after Hawthorne's name to a yell, and he directed his yelling over to a figure on a couch not far away. Several people flinched.

"Yeah, yeah," a man, presumably Hawthorne, said. "Still waiting to hear one better from you, Vladim!"

Vladim rolled his eyes and redirected his attention to Cait and Curie.

"I gave job to Valentine Detective Agency, but detective has been out of town on another case. I do not want to let case go cold." Vladim sighed. "Poor Earl. Gone just like that. Such a good bartender. Good friend. Oh, but terrible with women, mind you. Bull in china shop with them."

"Cait, I like this job. If Monsieur Earl is dead, we can give Monsieur Vladim some peace of mind, but if Monsieur Earl is alive, then we may do an awful lot of good. A lot more good than we might do finding something that needs 'shot or killed or cleared.'"

"I dunno, Curie. It's not really my style. I usually just stick to what I'm good at, and it ain't detective work."

"Job is four hundred caps," Vladim piped up.

"Deal," Cait said.

"Excellent," Vladim said. "Here is key to Earl's house. I take look myself, but I do not find anything. But Curie is scientist, and you are professional asshole. I am sure you two can find something I cannot."

Curie took the key, turning it over in her hands. It was a small metal thing, probably originally meant to be used as a locker key, but Diamond City was a shantytown. Cait was sure people used whatever they could get their hands on to lock their doors.

According to Vladim's directions, Earl's place was 'right next to' the Dugout Inn. In reality, Diamond City was a mess of a town that only made sense if you lived in it. Who had even put the industrial walkways in these back alleys? For what purpose? It just made it more difficult to access the houses.

But they found Earl's house eventually, a sloping, mess of a tin shack building, and let themselves in. Dust motes drifted through the air, sunlight filtering in through cracks in the corrugated tin cover of the building. It was evident no one had been here in days.

Four hundred caps or not, Cait doubted they would be able to find Earl. It was a hell of a lot easier to make a person go missing than it was to find them again. But she'd have been a fool to turn down the job for that many caps. Worst case scenario, they told Vladim they couldn't find anything, and they didn't get paid. But if they got lucky and did find something, the payout would be huge.

Cait sighed.

"Guess we start riflin' through his stuff?" she said, walking over to a dresser with scarred wood. "See if we find anything obvious. Like, 'Earl, you bastard, I'm gonna kill you' - signed, Vladim."

Curie gasped.

"You do not really think Vladim had anything to do with it, did you?"

Cait rolled her eyes.

"I think we won't get paid if we finger Vladim for this. Just look around, will ya?"

They shuffled through the various boxes and containers in his house for a little while. Earl's house was filled with crap, but it was mostly just that - crap. Empty tins of instamash and old scrap metal.

After about an hour of looking, Cait started to feel nauseous again, and she took a seat on the couch, closing her eyes and leaning her head back against the cushions, trying to steady herself. The spinning. The sick feeling that a rusty spoon was scraping her raw from the inside out. There were some papers scattered by the ground next to her, and she picked them up and sifted through them, to keep up the pretense that she was still looking. Instructions on how to make drinks. Old notes between him and Vladim that were mostly rude drawings. A receipt for facial surgery, some receipts for chems from Chem-I-Care, the local chem shop. It was probably a trash pile.

Curie came and set next to Cait after a few minutes.

"I do not feel right," she said, "going through this man's private things."

"That's literally what we were hired to do," Cait said.

Curie crossed her arms, leaning back into the couch and biting her lip.

"Back during my early days of operation...in ze vault, Doctor Burrows always treated me with great respect. Dignity. I did not understand, at first, some of the things he wanted for me. The way he spoke to me, it was not Robco protocol. He spoke to me as if I were...a person. An equal. Early on, he told me zat one of ze terminals in ze lab was mine, and mine alone. That no one would be allowed to access it but myself. And it made no sense to me. As a robot, if I was not sharing information, what was my purpose? What was the value of information that was mine and mine alone?"

"What are you saying?"

"Just - it does not feel right, searching this man's things. None of the scientists ever invaded the privacy of my terminal, even up to their dying days. I do not wish to invade the privacy of Monsieur Earl's life, either."

'Monsieur Earl' was probably dead, but Cait didn't mention that. She sighed.

"Wanna head back then? Tell Vladim we came up short? It's not even noon yet, odds are we can pick up another job before the end of the day."

"This seems acceptable," Curie said, standing. "Come, let us leave this place. I cannot stand to be here one minute longer."

They ended up just going back to the Dugout Inn for lunch, since it was familiar and Cait didn't like the glare of the sun outside with her headache right now. Curie insisted on paying for it, and Cait wasn't in a position to argue since she was dead broke, even though it made her sick to her stomach for an entirely different reason. More owed.

They didn't tell Vladim right away that they had given up so quickly. It had only been a little over an hour, after all. They took their seats at a table in the lobby and waved to the waitress, Scarlett, Cait had hear her called.

"Hey there," Scarlett said. "If you're hungry, we sell food, but usually people just order drinks."

Well, that was promising.

"What foods do you have? Anything you would recommend?"

"I would recommend the drinks," Scarlett deadpanned. "If you're looking for food, the cram is probably the safest. It's two hundred years old, but the Bobrov brothers didn't try to cook it, so."

"I will have a cram then," Curie said. "You as well, Cait?"

Just thinking about cram made Cait want to remove her own stomach.

"Just a water, thanks."

"Purified?"

"Nah."

"Oh but Cait, radiation should be avoided at all costs! It can damage you irreparably."

Too late for that, but Cait shrugged.

"Whatever," she said. "You're paying."

"Two bottles of purified water. And perhaps another cram, in case Cait changes her mind."

Scarlett nodded, and was beginning to head to the kitchen when Cait called after her.

"Hey, wait up," she said. "Did you know that missing bartender? Earl?"

They'd given up the job, but it was worth a shot. Scarlett worked here, after all.

"Oh yeah...Earl," Scarlett said.

"That's a tone," Cait remarked.

It sounded like she was talking about a particularly nasty wart. Scarlett shifted uncomfortably.

"I mean, I know I shouldn't speak ill of the missing, but that guy needed to get out more. You'd think a bartender would be... smooth, you know? Charming? Not Earl. He tried so hard, too. Way too hard. The real sad thing? He thought it was his looks. Kept talking about getting a new face over at the Mega Surgery. Wouldn't have helped."

Cait remembered seeing the surgery receipt on Earl's floor.

"'Wouldn't have'?" Cait asked. "He didn't get the surgery?"

"I never saw his new mug if he did. I thought he was all talk, to be honest. Like I said, though. Wouldn't have helped."

"Right," Cait said. "Thanks."

Scarlett walked off to get their orders, and Cait leaned in to Curie.

"There was a receipt for the surgery in Earl's house," Cait said. "He wasn't all talk. He was going to get a new face. I say, we talk up the people at the Mega Surgery Center. See if they know what happened to him. Maybe Earl had someone in particular he was trying to impress with his new face. Maybe they weren't so impressed."

Curie leaned back, grinning.

"You like zis mystery, don't you?"

"I like four hundred caps," Cait said.

When Scarlett delivered their cram and drinks, they shoved them into their pockets and headed for the door. Cait winced, her eyes having trouble adjusting to the noon lighting. She was so very tired. She stumbled for a moment, and Curie steadied her. Cait blamed it on the hangover. God, Curie was gonna think she was a lightweight by the end of this.

They stopped by Earl's house again to collect the receipt, then made their way to the Mega Surgery Center, which still felt so open to the public square. Unnervingly so. Curie was with Cait this time, and that helped. But she hadn't expected Doctor Sun to be such a little rat, either. Cait could see him recognize her, approach her. The words on the tip of his tongue. _How's the Psycho addiction coming along?_ She cut him off before he could speak, shoving the receipt towards him.

"Do you know anything about this receipt?"

Doctor Sun eyed her, taking in her stiff posture, his eyes darting between her and Curie. Seemed to comprehend that Curie didn't know. Curie did her part by looking too damn cheerful to know about a Psycho addiction. Doctor Sun glanced down at the receipt.

"Let me see...hmm. This is Doctor Crocker's deplorable handwriting all right. Looks like Earl Sterling was one of his patients. The procedure noted here is mundane. Low risk cosmetic work. Doctor Crocker never performed it, however, said Earl Vanished before he paid."

Damn. There went the 'new face' theory. But it was worth following up with the doctor who had actually spoken with Earl. Might have mentioned something to him.

"Where is Doc Crocker?" Cait asked.

"Last time I saw him, he had to get something out of the surgery cellar. Probably just had to wash some needles or move some storage around."

"Can we go talk to him?"

"Not while he's in the cellar, you can't. That's where we keep all our supplies."

"Oh Monsieur," Curie piped up, "we are not here to steal anything. We are simply trying to figure out what happened to Monsieur Earl. He has been missing for several days now."

Doctor Sun gauged Curie, and after a moment, his shoulders slumped, in more of a frustrated 'fine' gesture.

"Missing, huh?" he said. "Alright, but I come down there with you. I don't want to see either of you putting your hands where they shouldn't be. And I'll be taking inventory right after, and if I find one instrument out of place, you'll be getting the bill."

"No worries, Monsieur," Curie said, cutting Cait off, which was good because Cait was going to say 'get fucked.'

The hatch to the cellar was at the back of the open stand of the Mega Surgery Center, and Doctor Sun inserted a key, turned the lock, and opened it, gesturing to the ladder. Curie climbed down, then Cait, and they waited for their eyes to adjust to the lighting.

"There sure is a lot of blood in here," Cait said. "Is surgery storage usually this messy?"

It was no more blood than she was used to, so it didn't disturb her, but Doctor Sun seemed to freeze up on the ladder as he shut the hatch over him.

"Blood?" he said, rushing down the ladder. "No, there shouldn't be any biological hazards in here at - "

Something grabbed him from behind, pulling him into a shadow behind the ladder and pressing a needle up under Doctor Sun's chin.

"Just - just stop right there!" a voice said. "Nobody move! I can fix this. I can fix this, I can fix this. I can fix anything. There's just three more to fix now. That's all, that's all."

Doctor Sun paled, putting his hands slowly in the air.

"Now, listen, Doctor Crocker - "

"Shut up! Shut up shutupshutup. You always were a nuisance. And now you come down here, when I _specifically_ asked you not to. Didn't it occur to you that I was doing something important? Or did you just want to _ruin my life?!_ "

Cait started to reach for her shotgun, and Doctor Crocker positioned the needle more readily by Doctor Sun's neck, Doctor Sun straining to get as far from it as possible. They were both doctors, they both probably knew how to use a needle dangerously. Cait didn't doubt Doctor Sun would die if she attacked Doctor Crocker. But Doctor Crocker wouldn't be able to attack her and Curie if she got her shotgun out in time. She was weighing her options when Curie put her hand on Cait's arm, stilling her. Right. Curie would want to save Doctor Sun, if at all possible.

"Oh, naughty naughty!" Doctor Crocker said, his voice pitched and strained. "You're not supposed to be down here! But that's okay. I can fix that. I can fix anything."

Over in the corner, by Doctor Crocker, Cait finally made out the twisted shapes that were at his feet. What was once a body, hacked into smaller bits of meat, only recognizable by the stray foot and finger piled in the mess.

"I take it Earl's surgery didn't go well." Cait put together, slowly.

Curie followed her gaze, and blanched.

"Mon dieu," she said, softly.

"I didn't - I didn't do anything!" Doctor Crocker said. "It was Earl who didn't want to be happy! Good patients get a nice, new face. Bad patients bleed all over the floor because they want to _screw up their surgeon's life!_ I, uh, might have had, just a _bit_ of, Jet, before operating. So I nipped a few arteries I shouldn't have? Who hasn't? But I'm a problem solver, you see. I knew if Earl "disappeared" everyone would just think the Institute took him."

"And how does _chopping up a patient_ in our storage room factor into that?" Doctor Sun croaked.

"Earl's body needs to go away," Doctor Crocker said. "But you can't just get rid of two hundred pounds of cadaver without attracting attention. Fortunately, the butcher shop is close by. If their trash pile just happens to have an extra of box of rotten meat every week, who would think to look too closely?"

Doctor Sun was starting to struggle, that needle getting closer to his skin every time he tried to jerk out of Doctor Crocker's grip. Curie took a step forward, hands out. Trying to placate.

"You made a mistake, but you can still do the right thing, Doctor. Just think this through. Is it not the duty of the doctor or scientist to learn from their failures? You cannot deny the data."

Doctor Crocker's eyes locked onto Curie's, fixed on them, wide and hyperfocused. Doctor Crocker was high right now, Cait was sure of that. Who knew what was going through his head. Cait readied herself to draw her shotgun, if he lept at Curie.

"You're...you're right," he finally said. "There's one thing I can do. Only one thing is going to make this all better."

In a sudden motion, he shoved Doctor Sun forward, and Curie rushed to catch him. Cait saw Doctor Crocker bring the needle to his own arm.

"I. Can fix...anything," he said.

He plunged the trigger down, and seized up within the moment, mouth frothing and falling forward onto his knees, faceplanting into the floor.

"Doctor Crocker!" Curie shouted. "No!"

She rushed forward to examine him, and Doctor Sun got to his feet, standing next to Cait and watching Curie hover over Doctor Crocker. They both knew he was gone. Both knew that Curie wasn't ready to give up yet.

"Doctor Sun," Cait said, slowly.

 _Sorry about your business partner. He was kind of a dick though._ Did that sound alright? But Doctor Sun didn't wait for her to offer her condolences.

"You...you should go," he said, his voice still cracking from the stress.

"What?" Curie exclaimed. "How _can_ we leave? A man is - is dead here! And Earl - oh, Monsieur Earl - "

"Security has a habit of trying to pin things on outsiders. Makes the town feel safer inside the walls, and more afraid of the outside. If you're here when they come, I don't doubt they'll try and blame you two instead of believe what happened. I'm not an outsider. They'll accept my story when I tell it."

"But - but Monsieur Earl - "

Cait gently guided Curie to the ladder.

"There's nothing more we can do here, love," she said softly.

Curie shook her off angrily, but stormed up the ladder. Cait turned back for a moment.

"Thanks," she said to Doctor Sun. "For warning us."

Doctor Sun was kneeling next to the body, examining the needle Doctor Crocker had injected himself with. An empty Psycho needle.

"Take care of yourself," he said, slowly, turning it over in his hands.

Cait climbed back up the ladder, and was surprised that Curie wasn't waiting for her above it. She glanced around, a little panicked, before catching sight of her ragged flannel shirt disappearing into the bleacher tunnel that served as the gateway into and out of Diamond City.

"Curie!" she called. "Wait up!"

Curie didn't wait. Cait hustled out after her, stumbling and catching herself a few times. She was just feeling worse as the day went on, more and more dizzy, more twisted and broken inside. But she had to catch up to Curie.

Curie was out in the junkyard next to Diamond City, throwing tin cans at old cars. Cait slowed to a stop. She'd never seen Curie like this. When Curie turned to pick up another can, Cait saw that there were tears streaming openly down her face.

"Curie," Cait said, soft and quiet as she could. Gentle. Like how Curie had said her name, taken her hand in her own at that table in the Third Rail.

But Cait wasn't as good at comfort, she supposed. Curie hurled another can, some kind of growling, injured noise coming from her throat.

"We - we did not help anyone!" she said. "I did not help anyone! I cannot - I cannot help anyone, I cannot fix anything! Doctor Amari - she believed in me! She believed my knowledge, with human cognition, she believed it could save lives! And now, I cannot even - "

"Curie? Curie, you need to calm down a bit - just sit down and breathe - "

"What is the mortality rate of Influenze C? Cait, I used to know this. This and many other things. And now all I know is that I do not know. I do not remember this mortality rate, I cannot master Doctor VanTudle's advanced stimpack recipe, I cannot even hold a toothbrush - I cannot breathe properly! I cannot fix anyone, I cannot fix anything! What was the point of all this?"

"Curie, the - the point?"

Cait couldn't keep up. She was too sick, too dizzy, too unpracticed in comfort.

"Can the world really be full of such... tragedy? I thought this was only in books. What was the point of any of this tragedy? Monsieur Earl's death, Doctor Crocker's! What was the point of us looking for him?"

"Well, we - we finished the job. Vladim's gonna pay us, Curie."

" _Pay_ us? Men are dead, Cait! Can you really be thinking about material gain?"

"Well, what _do_ you want?" Cait was starting to get frustrated. Her attempts at comfort weren't getting her anywhere, and everything hurt, everything inside of her was twisted around like the disemboweled innards of Earl Sterling on the floor of the cellar.

"I want to know what ze point of all this was! I want to know what good any of us did, what possible reason there could be for this kind of tragedy - "

"There ain't no point to tragedy!" Cait snapped. "You think there was a point to any of my tragedy? My shite parents, years of nothing but beatin' people to a pulp and gettin' beat right back in the Combat Zone? Every fuckin' thing in between? And for what?"

"You are still alive, Cait! We still have time to make that tragedy worthwhile - "

"Ain't _nothin_ ' ever gonna make that shite worthwhile! Nothin' can ever pay me back for twenty-six years of _hell_ , don't you ever mistake that! Even if the rest of my life were daisies - and it ain't gonna be, it's just gonna be more _shite_ \- even if the rest of my life were daisies, I didn't deserve that. No one does. But everyone gets it because life is _shite_ and there ain't no fuckin' _point_ to it!"

"You cannot mean zis!" Curie snapped right back. "I expect better from you! You cannot mean what you are saying!"

"Oh yeah?" Cait sneered, taking a step back. _I expect better from you_ echoed around in her head. "Well, don't. Let me know if you find any greater meaning, out here throwing tin cans around."

She stormed out into the streets, refusing to look behind her. She knew where she was headed. Mass Pike Tunnel. She needed to kill things.

Halfway there, she doubled over, retching. The nausea that had haunted her all day coming to a peak. She threw up blood. Coughed up parts that she knew shouldn't come outside of her. Confirmed what she'd known all day.

She was dying. She was still dying. Even two-hundred-caps worth of Fixer couldn't clear out how deep the Psycho had her. _That's a hefty addiction. To be honest, I haven't heard of someone livin' that long with a serious addiction to a heavy chem like that._ Seven years. Ever since she'd left home. All the work she'd done, all the effort she'd spent depriving herself, all this weakness she'd felt, and it was worth nothing. There was no point to any of it.

There were dead raiders outside of Mass Pike Tunnel, an old camp that had been wiped out by the ferals. There were dead ghouls here and there, but mostly raiders. Their old camp had what she needed. She found them in a chem box underneath one of the days-old, rotting bodies. Five needles of Psycho.

She injected them all at once.

She needed them. The scraping raw from the inside out the Fixer had done to her, she was empty inside and bleeding. She needed steel to fill her veins with. She was dying anyway. She didn't want to die feeling like a crushed tin can. She wanted to be invincible.

The chem took her, coursed through her, instant relief, instant high. She leaned her head back, looked at the sky, and shouted. Plunged into the old subway system, Mass Pike Tunnel.

She didn't remember much after that.

Time skips. She'd experienced them before. But this was more like lightning. Minutes of darkness, of unawareness, out of her own sick and dying body, illuminated by lightning flashes of memory, sound rushing in like thunder. The snarls of the ferals, which she tore in two with her bare hands. Ferals thrashing underneath of her in the water flooding the subways. The occasional raider, holding out in the tunnels. She ripped them with her bare hands too.

There was no difference between her and the ferals. She was alright with that.

When she came too, when the chems started wearing off, it was sunset, and she was heading blindly towards Diamond City. She had a meager pile of caps clutched in her bare bloody fists, scavenged from the ferals and raiders in Mass Pike Tunnel. A lightning flash of awareness. Then she was in the markets, past market hours, past closing. But there was one stall that was always open.

Diamond City Surplus. She'd heard the Mister Handy robot, Percy. loudly declaring the other night that they were open twenty-four seven. He was speaking to her now, but she hardly heard what he said to her. Lightning flash. Gone.

"Do you have a terminal?" she asked.

"Well, we have terminal parts. But a working terminal - you would need a hookup, and a generator, and the hardware itself would probably cost about a thousand caps - "

"Don't got that," Cait grunted. "Anything else? Anything like that?"

"Anything like - like a terminal? What is it you're looking for?"

Cait thought for a moment, as hard as she could. Trying to remember things through the lightning flashes.

"Give me a notebook," she said. "You've got those, right?"

"I have a few," Percy said. "Here. Fifteen caps."

Cait just shoved over all the caps she had, wiping her hand on her shirt before taking the notebook from Percy.

Lightning flash. Blank space in her memory. What was the mortality rate of Influenza C?

She was in the lobby of the Dugout Inn, at the bar. Asking Vladim to get the notebook to Curie.

"You know," Vladim was saying, "you are second person today to leave something boring for Curie. Little girl came by earlier, left a report on mutfruit with me. Now you leave blank notebook. What is point of passing things along if I am not even tempted to steal them?"

He laughed heartily.

"Do you have a pencil?" Cait asked suddenly, as if she hadn't spoken.

"Here," Vladim said, handing her the one from the clipboard Scarlett usually used to take orders.

Cait bent over the notebook, opening it to the first page. Trying to still her shaking hands enough to be legible, at least.

 _It's no computer terminal, but._

 _I hope you find your meaning._

She pushed the notebook across the bar to Vladim. It was the best she could do. A shitty fifteen-cap apology to Curie, for abandoning her during the one time she'd lashed out. But Cait wasn't Curie. She couldn't cultivate kindness in isolation. She'd snapped right back at her, instead of offering comfort.

It was like she'd said. She was terminal. A terminal asshole.

Another lightning flash of memory, and something twisted in her stomach. She found herself in the public bathroom, shoving her shotgun underneath of the door handle to keep the door locked. She coughed up more blood and waited to die.


	12. Chapter 12

"Cait! Cait, wake up. Please wake up."

A soft voice, a gentle one. With a heavy French accent Cait no longer thought of as annoying.

"Come, no need for shaking. I have perfect hangover cure."

Another voice, this one deeper, more jovial.

"Vladim," yet another voice intoned, "this lady is not hungover."

"Cait! Please, what is wrong with her?"

"What do you mean is not hungover? Is passed out on bathroom floor! That is hungover if ever I see it, Yefim."

"There is blood crusted around lips, Vladim. Even our moonshine is not that bad."

A beat of dead silence.

"I - get ze doctor. Please! Cait! Cait!"

"Vladim, go wake Doctor Sun. Hurry."

"Fine. I still think we can fix with cold bucket of water."

Cait floated just below the surface of consciousness, feeling like she was drowning every moment, unable to breathe. Voices drifted to her slowly, muffled, and she tried to follow them out. Vladim's loud, boisterous insistences on a cold-water wakeup. Yefim's quiet concern. Curie's rising tone of panic. They tried to lead her to the surface. But she kept getting lost under the water, twisting ever deeper into it, the shadows at the edges of her vision blackening until they took on a tint of red.

A pain on the inside of her arm. The breaking of skin, something sliding its way between her muscles. Not an unfamiliar sensation. A needle.

Gravity shifted, the world turned upside down. She was no longer sinking, but falling towards the surface, like the sea was the sky and the endless expanse of space was below her. She didn't want to fall into it. To fall through the bottom of the surface, fall forever. She fought to swim up, back towards the black depths of the water, even as she choked on it, but she wasn't strong enough. She broke the surface, choking, gasping.

"Shh, Cait," someone said, holding her back gently as she tried to shoot straight up. "Don't try to move yet."

Cait's vision cleared, the shadows creeping back to the edges of her vision rather than front and center of it. The sweat that drenched her made her wonder if she had only been imagining drowning, or if in some strange way, she really had just fallen out of an ocean in the sky.

"Doctor Sun?" she asked, making out the hazy basic shapes and colours of his form. The black, plain hair, his wide-set cheekbones.

His strict lips twitched.

"You said my name correctly," he said. As though he were touched by it.

People had such a low standard for kindness, really.

"Fixer didn't work, Doc," she said.

Doctor Sun deflated, gave a grim nod.

"I'm afraid..." he started.

"I know," Cait said, cutting him off. It looked like it would hurt him to say it. "I already know."

He seemed to grapple with himself for a moment. Cait didn't know what for. For some new solution, one that didn't exist? For the right words to say? They didn't exist either. Cait had learned that, again, and again, and again. She closed her eyes, imagining the inky black depths of the ocean. It hadn't felt irradiated, the way the ocean really was, or full of the dead things always washing up onto shore. It had just felt empty, colourless, emotionless. That's what she needed now. She'd been seeing colour too long.

"I wish there were something I could do," Doctor Sun whispered.

Cait hadn't been expecting that. Hadn't expected him to give a shite. She cocked one eye open, examining him with whatever energy she had left. Artificial energy, running through her veins from where he'd slipped a needle under her skin.

"There is somethin' you can do," she said.

His brow furrowed, and she nodded her jaw over at the door.

"What'd that bloke in the basement use t'off himself? Crocker?"

"Radscorpion venom," Doctor Sun said, and after a moment, he was digging around in his bag, pulling out a smaller satchel from within. He turned it over in his hands. "From what I can tell. Think there's a few other ingredients in these. Antifreeze. Abraxo. There was a whole drawer of them in that cellar, when I searched it. I keep trying to figure out..."

"Figure out what?"

"...if it was painful."

"Didn't look painful," she said. "Crocker just looked - tired."

His gaze clouded over for a moment, but he shook himself out of it, looking back at her.

"You say there's something I can do for you?"

Cait nodded. Shut her eyes again.

"It's Curie," Cait said. "I think she's had enough o' this shite. I think I have, too. And I don't want her t'come back in here an' - an' _guilt_ me inta bein' alive." Cait opened her eyes, stared the doctor right in the face. He had such nice brown eyes. He'd never made eye contact with her for long enough for her to notice. "I'm tired, Sun. I've gotten me hopes up an' been let down so many times. I don't got another one left in me."

Doctor Sun seized up, hands tightening around the satchel of needles.

"You're not saying - "

"Think of it as a mercy. Think of it as whatever you need to thinkve it as. Just - I'm so tired."

Doctor Sun looked away for a moment, eyes fixing on a blank point on the wall. Cait knew that trick. Forcing tears back into your eyes. Cait liked to think she was better at it, because when Doctor Sun turned back, his eyes were still shining just enough to know.

"I'm sorry," he said. "I don't think I have that in me either. Maybe that makes me just another bastard."

"Just give 'em to me, then," Cait said. "I think I can do it, now. I know how t'work a needle."

Doctor Sun nodded, slowly. His hands shook around the bag, a cheap canvas thing made out of an old pre-war potato sack. Cait held out her hand, and he started to hand it over. Stopped.

"What if," he started.

"Ain't no 'what if' Doc."

He shook his head.

"You saved my life today," he said. "Have you heard of Vault 95?"

"Curie saved your life, not me. Don't try and pull that."

But he was already pulling his hand back, bringing the satchel back in closer to his chest. Cait could have throttled him, thought about mustering the energy to take it from him herself.

"Some Gunners came through last week, and one of them was talking about a machine in Vault 95 that could clean the blood. He was trying to get me to lower my prices for addictol. Cait, if we could clean your blood - "

"I've just told you how tired I am, and you're tryin' to get me to spend the last of me energy on a rumour from some Gunner trash anglin' for a discount?"

"It's worth a - "

"I've _heard_ of Vault 95, Doctor Sun. It was too dangerous then an' it's too damn difficult now."

His voice lowered.

"You're right," he said. "It was Curie who saved my life today. And I know how she's going to look at me if I hand you these needles and then walk out there and tell her - "

"Fuck," Cait said, cutting him off. A rush of anger stirred her enough to start seeing colour again. The chipped green paint of the bathroom stalls, the tarnished yellow of the wall and floor tile. "Fuck you. Don't you come in here an' guilt me for her."

"Why is it guilt you feel? I'm telling you someone loves you."

"Why _wouldn't_ that make me feel guilty?!" Cait shut her eyes again. The energy, the anger, the colour, left her as quickly as it had come. "Please, Doc. I don't beg often. Just - please."

The doctor sighed. There was a shaking to it, like he might cry, but was just too tired to. Cait knew that kind of sigh. After a long silence, a long waiting, where Cait almost thought she might fall asleep, a rough stretch of canvas brushed her leg. She forced her heavy eyelids back open, watched Sun place the bag next to her and hold onto it for a long moment before finally letting go.

"Thanks, doc," Cait said, pulling the bag open and digging out a needle.

She held it up to the shitty fluorescent bathroom lights, examining it. It wasn't much different from a Psycho needle. The colour was darker, the substance maybe a bit less smooth. She pressed the handle down, tapped it, to get the air bubbles out, as though that mattered. A force of habit.

"You don't have t'be here," she said.

"I have to tell Curie," he said. "When it's done."

She smiled.

"One last guilt trip?"

"I'm telling you one last time," Doctor Sun said, "that you're loved."

Cait breathed in a slow breath, and traced her hand down a familiar vein. Thumbed the handle. In the next room over, a new song started to play on Vladim's radio.

 _Like an earthquake, starting to roll_

 _I felt my world shake, out of control_

 _Like a world war starting to brew_

 _Baby, it's just you._

And she couldn't help but remember that night in the Third Rail, Curie and her newfound legs dancing to the music. Bringing her onto the dance floor to dance along, too. The twists, the laughter.

 _Like a cyclone, wild and extreme_

 _I got my mind blown, stalking your dreams_

 _Waking up without a clue_

 _Cause baby, it's just you._

 _You leave me breathless, weak in the knees_

 _I'm feeling reckless, pardon me please_

 _The fallout's blowing through_

 _But baby, it's just you._

Cait remembered getting more into it than she had expected, wanting to show off, wanting to impress her. Remembered how quickly Curie had figured out her moves, and been spinning her, when Cait had expected to be doing the spinning. How they had ended in a dip - with Curie dipping Cait.

 _Help me, help me, rescue my heart_

 _Save me, save me, from falling apart_

 _Take me, take me, baby I'm sure_

 _You've got the power, you've got the cure._

It wasn't fair. It wasn't goddamned fair. The needle dropped from Cait's fingers, clattered onto the ground. She didn't feel tired anymore. She felt deeply, irreparably broken. Like the colours weren't ever going to leave her, but they weren't ever going to be right, either.

"I'm just another bastard, too, Sun," Cait said. "Fine. Tell Curie about Vault 95. And tell Vladim to turn of that damn radio."

Curie had agreed to help, of course, agreed before anyone had even asked. Doctor Sun had barely finished explaining about Vault 95 and Curie was already arranging things. A Brahmin, for Cait to ride on, since she wouldn't be able to walk. Supplies for the journey. How to keep Cait alive long enough to reach the place. Psycho, Doctor Sun had told her, in small doses. They'd discussed dosages in medical terms Cait didn't understand.

Vladim never did turn off his radio.

She remembered the first time she'd ever seen the ocean.

She'd grown up in a trailer park, half lived-in, half empty. Some nights her parents had chained her up outside the trailer like a dog, other nights they'd relied upon her fear of starvation to keep her close by. Fear of the unknown. And then it had hit her all at once, when she'd been sold, unknown thing after unknown thing after terrible unknown thing. And one of those unknown things had been the ocean.

When she'd first seen it, it was after she'd been sold for the fourth time. She'd been sold back and forth a lot at first, because no one had much use for her. She hadn't known how to read, how to write, how to cook or even communicate very well. She'd been half feral, a dog her parents had raised masquerading as human enough to sell. She'd learned writing, and reading, and cooking, but not well enough for anyone's satisfaction. They'd get frustrated with her, and sell her off again, to someone else who was passing through too quickly to know better.

The merchant who'd bought her this time made camp on the beach, waiting for a boat to take them across the sound. The beach was filled with the washed-up carcases of blubbery sea creatures who couldn't handle the irradiated water, their skin raised and bloodied with boils and mutations, picked at daily by birds. The sand itself seemed to have a slight static to it, leftover radiation from the water which soaked it at high tide. Cait, at nineteen, had looked out over that horizon and thought to herself that nothing could be more endless and unknowable than the ocean.

She'd changed her mind not long after. After all, there wasn't much to know about the ocean, besides that ugly dead things washed up on its shores. The ocean was not so special in that regard.

Cait awoke from her dreaming about the ocean to the feeling of a needle sliding under her skin. Her eyes flickered open, half-afraid to. But deep blue eyes met hers.

"Cait?" a soft voice asked. "You are awake?"

A hand, Cait thought, was laid so delicately along her jaw. But she couldn't be sure.

"How long?" Cait asked, her mouth dry like cotton. _How long have I been asleep?_

"A day," Curie told her. "Almost. We are halfway there. Hold on, just a little longer, yes?"

The drugs were entering her system, now, and she was parched for them. She felt them spread through her like the warmth from a hot drink on a cool day, and some stray lyrics found their way into her head, lyrics about earthquakes and trains and a heart that wasn't broken yet, a heart that only needed saving.

She was trying to say something. Something about the journey, she thought. Maybe she had been trying to thank someone. But she couldn't even remember who she'd been talking to.

"When I'm gone," she said instead, "put me in the ocean. I think I'd like it there."

She remembered the first time a needle had sunk under her skin, that thin line of metal parting between folds so small she couldn't even see them. She'd known it would hurt, but she hadn't expected the way it would hurt. She'd been stabbed before, slapped, hit, broken. Her skin had been ripped and it had been burned and it had been bruised. But this small parting - it wasn't the worst pain, by far. It was very bearable. But it was surprising, after being so experienced with pain, to find a new breed of it. The subtle, dull way the metal reminded her it was beneath her skin.

Carrick had smiled at her, a facade of reassurance, as if her start had been one of pain.

"Shh," he'd told her. "Just relax. Sooner or later, the chems make the pain go away."

She'd nodded, not contradicting him. Not bothering to tell him she wasn't in pain. He'd leaned in, making the extra effort to catch her eye. She looked away. Eye contact wasn't usually wise, but this one - he kept trying to push her. Like he was trying to get her caught doing something wrong. She'd thought that maybe he wanted the excuse to beat her.

"You don't talk much, do you?" he'd asked.

She hadn't, back then. Only when she was spoken to. God, she'd been weak back then, and so fucking afraid. All the time, afraid of everyone, of everything, from the ocean to some goddamned eye contact.

"I'm sorry," she'd said. It was usually a wise idea to apologize.

Carrick had run his thumb along the outer edge of the collar around her throat while Cait struggled with the first surge of the Psycho. He'd hummed as she'd clenched her fists, bit her lip until it bled.

"I don't like my slaves already broken," he'd told her. "I like to break them myself."

"I'm sorry," she'd said again, trembling. Waiting to be hit. But no hit came.

"That's okay," he'd said, surprising her. And then, "I think you're faking it," he'd whispered, almost conspiratorially.

 _Faking what?_ But she hadn't asked.

"I think," Carrick had said, his orange hair falling into his face as he leaned forward, "you're not as submissive as you pretend to be. No one can be, with a collar on them like that. No," he'd said. "I think you're waiting."

"Waiting for what?"

The words had slipped out unbidden, bitter and jaded. What the hell could she be waiting for? What other god-awful, miserable _thing_ could happen to her in her life that would make her finish with being afraid? She hadn't been able to stand up to her parents. She hadn't been able to stand up to any of the people who had owned her - even the worst of them, the ones who had hurt her in ways that played themselves out again and again every night when she tried to get whatever sleep had been allotted to her. What the fuck other _thing_ could happen that would change this?

"You'll see," Carrick had said. "You'll see."

Cait thought the sound of gunfire was distant, but slowly she began to realize that it was just her own fractured consciousness diluting the sound. There was a battle going on, probably not more than a few feet from her. She heard Curie huffing, shouting, and though from the end of a tunnel. The distinctive sound of her laser rifle, firing, again and again and again. She heard these things, but she couldn't open her eyes to see them. She couldn't find her eyes to open them, couldn't locate the part of her brain that would tell her body to move, her hands to clutch her shotgun and help. She couldn't help. She couldn't help anybody, couldn't defend Curie.

Somewhere in the mess of sound making its way to her, the horrible, twisted bleat of a brahmin in pain reached her, drowned out the other sounds. And then that sound, too, drowned itself out. She was fading even further, losing any grasp on consciousness the gunfire might have momentarily drawn her to. She fought to keep it, fought to stay, fought to find her fingers and her legs and her goddamned shotgun. To find anything.

Twenty-four thousand, five hundred, and forty-seven. It was the only concrete thing she could manage to find. A number, floating around in her head for no reason. She had twenty-four thousand, five hundred, and forty-seven freckles. Someone had told her that once.

Unconsciousness claimed her slowly like the rising tide of the endless ocean.

Carrick had bought her, and entered her in the pit fights.

Everyone else had called him crazy for doing it. Cait, they'd said, was too small, weak, malnourished, damaged. They said the pits would eat her alive. Cait had been afraid of that, too, terrified she'd die. She'd begged not to be sold.

"I know a dog with bite when I see one," Carrick had said, and thrown down five hundred caps for her.

He'd hopped her up on Psycho and thrown her into the ring. She'd lost her first fight, and then her second, and then her third, and her fourth, and her fifth. Beaten nearly within an inch of her life every time, by slaves that were as pumped full of chems as she was. And every single fight, Carrick would sit in the audience and watch, grinning. Waiting.

Her sixth fight, her opponent had gotten his fingers under her collar, and had pinned her to the side of the cage by her neck. She'd dangled there, her legs kicking out, trying to push him off of her to no avail. She waited for the announcer to call the match, as her vision blackened and blurred. But no call came. From the crowd, she heard the spectators calling for blood.

 _Kill, kill, kill, kill, kill._

She'd thought of the ocean, and all the mangled corpses that washed up out of it. The ocean was endless, and uncaring, and empty. It was an oblivion. She felt headed for oblivion herself, her lungs burning in their strangulation. And then Cait had looked up.

There was no such oblivion on the face of her opponent. His face was masked with a sick pleasure, a relief. She was going to die, and not him. And he was going to _enjoy_ killing her. Holding her aloft, watching the light drain from her eyes, watching oblivion claim her. His fingers dug in deeper to the skin of her neck under her collar. He'd leaned in, cocky, to drink in the fear in her eyes.

She saw the fear in his eyes, the moment the fear left her own. In that moment, she'd twisted forward, into his grip, hard enough to bruise her battered throat and cut off the last of her air. It didn't matter. She was close enough. She bit into the skin of his cheek, bit down to the bone, and tore his flesh away with her teeth.

He'd dropped her, screaming, but she hadn't hesitated. Hadn't even taken a moment to regain her breathing, to spit his skin out of her mouth, before her fists were flying, pounding, _tearing_ into him. She'd broken her knuckles on his face, mixed her blood with his, crunched bones under her blows.

The Psycho found itself in her. The colours around her righted themselves, everything seemed to suddenly make sense. The fear, the pounding of her heart, it found a target that wasn't her for once. Violence. She wasn't afraid anymore. All that fear, she threw it onto her opponent on the ground, fistfull after fistfull of it, crashing and crashing and crashing into his skull and shattering it and spraying brain across the ground and into her eyes and mouth and hair and hitting him still, more, more, harder, harder. Her shoulders heaved, her breathing settled into a kind of roar in her ears.

The announcer took her fist, held it aloft, shouted her victory. The crowd was screaming, much of it in anger, losing money on their bets against her. But she was no longer afraid of their anger. In the crowd, she met Carrick's eyes, and did not look away. He was grinning ear to ear.

In that moment, she wanted nothing more than for Carrick to be the one whose brains she beat into the dirt.

Beneath her feet, a bloody slave collar was slid off of what was left of her opponent's neck, to be used on someone else.

A needle slid under her skin, again, that dull throbbing feeling of metal, and she didn't know if she was dreaming or not. She wanted the ocean. She wanted oblivion. She wanted to lose herself in the beating in of a skull.

But this time, the needle stayed under longer. She felt a full dose enter her system. She found the part of her brain that controlled her body, her eyes, her fingers, her legs. She forced her eyelids open. Licked her lips.

Curie was kneeling over her. Her hair was dirty and mussed, and a streak of either blood or dirt or both was dried into her jawline. They were on the dirt of a hill, seemingly in the middle of nowhere. Dark clouds gathered on the horizon, a radiation storm blowing in from the Glowing Sea.

"Why..." Cait started, her voice dry and cracked. "Why am I more awake, this time?"

She'd felt Curie giving her these small doses of Psycho meant to keep her alive, but each time, it had been like a small taste of consciousness. But this was a full wake up. A hungover wakeup, sure, after only thirty minutes sleep, but a wakeup nonetheless.

"I gave you a higher dosage," Curie replied. "I know I vill not be able to clear Vault 95 on my own. I had to take ze risk."

Cait sat up, slowly. Her muscles felt sore, tight, unused. Like her sinew had been unwound and then wound back together all wrong.

"Clear?" she asked. "Who's in it? Raiders?"

Curie shook her head.

"I could handle raiders, I think. But Gunners are far more well-armed."

Cait held her head in her hands.

"Shite," she said. "Gunners. Are you sure you want t'do this? There ain't no shame in turnin' back now."

"Zey are not so formidable," Curie said. "First zere is trash, zen zere is Gunners. Remember?"

Cait smiled for a moment, despite herself. It faded quickly.

"I'm bein' serious, Curie."

"I said I vould always be there for you," Curie whispered. "I did mean it."

"We said a lot've other things, too."

Cait was thinking of all the bad things. All of the horrible, hateful words she had ever said to Curie.

 _Tin can. Trash can. Saw-hands Sally._

 _I'm not a_ fucking _robot, Curie!_

 _All of humanity's caught asshole, Curie! And no amount of kindness is gonna fix that! Welcome to bein' human, Curie -_ This _is what humanity looks like!_

"And I still 'ave many things I wish to say to you yet," Curie said.

Cait nodded, and found her way to her feet, unsteady. Held out her hand for her shotgun, which Curie had strapped onto her back. Now that she was standing, she could see a rise just a bit to the east, which looked like it had a structure built into it. Vault 95.

"Alright," Cait said. "Together?"

"Together," Curie nodded. "Zat way, neither one of us need be invincible."

The word _invincible_ rang around in her head.

Cait looked over at the hill that must be Vault 95, and realized that she had never lost that fear of everyone and everything, that her violence had never cured her of it. That she didn't know how not to be afraid.

Curie was looking in the same direction she was, and her fear matched her own. A hand found its way into Cait's, interlocked their fingers together, squeezed. And Cait decided she didn't need to know how not to be afraid.

Their hands dropped, readied themselves on their weapons, and they stepped towards the vault together.


End file.
